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LITERARY AND HISTORICAL 




G E O K a E 



CHOFT. 


NEW 

H A R r E 11 & 


YORK : 

BROTHERS, 


FRANKLIN SQUAER 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1855, 

By GEOEGE BANCROFT, 

in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern 

District of New York. 



CONTENTS. 

PACK 

ESSAYS: 

I. THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS, 1824, - - 1 

II. ENNUI, 1830, - -- -- -- -- - 44 

III. THE RULING PASSION IN DEATH, 1833, - - - 75 

STUDIES IN GERMAN LITERATURE, 1824 AND FOL¬ 
LOWING YEARS: 

I. GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS, ------ 103 

II. THE REVIVAL OF GERMAN LITERATURE, - - 124 

III. MEN OF SCIENCE AND LEARNING, - - - - 152 

IV. THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE, - - - 167 

V. TRANSLATIONS, 1818—1824, ------ 206 

STUDIES IN HISTORY: 

I. ECONOMY OF ATHENS, 1831, - - - - - 247 

II. DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE, 1834, - - - 280 

III. RUSSIA, 1829, - -- -- -- -- - 318 

IV. THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY, 1829, - - 334 








IV 


CONTENTS 


PAGK 

OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES: 

I. A WORD ON CALVIN THE REFORMER, OCT. 1834, 405 

II. THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE IN ART, GOVERN¬ 
MENT AND RELIGION, 1835, _ _ - - - 408 

III. IN MEMORY OF WM. ELLERY CHANNING, 1842, - 436 

IV. ORATION COMMEMORATIVE OF ANDREW JACK- 

SON, 1845, - -- -- -- -- - 444 

> 

V. THE NECESSITY, .THE REALITY, AND THE PRO¬ 
MISE OF THE PROGRESS OF THE HUMAN 
RACE, 1854, - - 481 




THE DOCTRINE OE TEMPERAMENTS. 


THE FIVE SOURCES OF DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MEN. 

The connexion between the mind and the body can 
never be explained. As yet, the first principles on 
which it depends, have not been discovered. Nature, 
in her mysterious operations, eludes the sagacity of the 
most careful observers. Her venerable form is con¬ 
cealed by a veil, which no mortal has been permitted to 
raise. The first cause is “ that which hath been, which 
is, and which shall be, and which no man has compre¬ 
hended.’' But we can notice the relation between one 
set of appearances and another, and may hope to be 
benefited by practical inductions from our observations. 
By them we are led to regard the body, not merely as 
the temporary abode of the soul, but also as the instru¬ 
ment by which knowledge is acquired and purposes 
executed. No idea of the external world finds its way 
to the mind but through the senses; while the action 
of the internal organs excites the passions, modifies the 
operations of thought, and imparts pecuharities to the 
moral nature. 


1 




2 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


The union and reciprocal influence of the mind 
and body are estabhshed before the period for observa¬ 
tion has arrived. If the reasonings of physiologists are 
just, the infant at its birth is already possessed of a con¬ 
sciousness of its being. It has its passions, its desires, 
its propensities; and not only its physical organization 
is decided, but also the complexion of its character. 
There remains room for education to accomphsh her 
high designs in developing its powers, in confirm¬ 
ing its advantages, in counteracting its faults, in sup¬ 
plying its deficiencies, in tempering its elements. But 
there are certain limits, within which this influence of 
art is restrained. The features of the mind, as of the 
face, are fixed beyond the possibility of change. Free 
opportunity is left for the culture of morals; but it is 
also decided, by what vices the child, on ripening to 
manhood, wiU be most liable to be assailed, and in 
what virtues he is constitutionally fitted to excel. 

The native peculiarities of individuals may be illus¬ 
trated by enumerating those which experience has 
shown to exist. Sex renders a diversity of moral char¬ 
acter inevitable. But not to dwell on this universal 
division, there may clearly be observed in every one at 
least five sources of difference, residing in his original 
organization. 

The human family, which now occupies the earth, 
is composed of several races. Some illustrious physi¬ 
ologists have, it is true, contended that strictly speaking 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


3 


there is but one; and that men, descended from com¬ 
mon parents, have been variously changed by the con¬ 
tinued influence of climate and regimen. But while 
speculative science leads to the behef in a common 
origin, and establishes beyond a doubt the unity of our 
kind, the difference at present actually exists; and the 
child inherits the physical and moral characteristics of 
the race to which it belongs. The Englishman and 
the Hindoo, though natives of the same city, are from 
birth unlike in mind and in feature. 

The same race has been variously modified in 
difierent ages of the world. The Greek of the Byzan¬ 
tine Empire was not as the Greek of the Athenian 
democracy. The Roman of to-day is not the Roman 
of the Commonwealth. A German baron of the pres¬ 
ent time is all unlike the feudal robber of the middle 
ages. Each generation bears marks by which it may 
be distinguished from any former one. These differ¬ 
ences, though they are the result of the state of society 
in its influence on the individuals who compose it, are 
nevertheless in some measure hereditary; so that the 
new-born child is affected by the age in which its ex¬ 
istence commences. This is confirmed by analogies, 
drawn from the whole animal creation. 

Nations, also, have their characteristics, which are 
transmitted from one generation to another. The infant, 
therefore, receives with its original frame the pecuharities 
of its nation. To what degree this modification of char- 




4 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


acter extends, it is difficult to determine. It probably 
reaches further than we may, at first thought, be ready 
to beheve, and not only inclines the mind to certain 
habits and particular sentiments, to such virtues as 
valor and prudence, but also to such vices as rapacity 
and cruelty, to cunning, to effeminacy, to superstition, 
to servUe obedience. It gives an aptitude for acqui¬ 
escing in certain forms of society and government, and 
a facility for the acquisition and use of a particular lan¬ 
guage. The Frenchman is bom with a natural predis¬ 
position to cheerfulness; the American Indian with an 
innate passion for the chase; the Arab of the desert 
with a propensity to plunder. Who will hesitate to 
ascribe the bravery of the Cossacks to a peculiarity 
common to their nation, and continued by descent? 
Who will doubt, that there are tribes of men naturally 
unwarlike ? Is it not to be believed, that the physical 
organization of many a Tartar tribe inclines them to a 
wandering life ? Could any possible education make 
/ of the next generation of the serfs in Russia good 
citizens of a free, popular government ? Animals often 
show pecuhar skill in matters, to which not they, but 
their parents, have been trained. The books of the 
naturalists furnish well-attested examples of qualities 
thus inherited. In like manner we may believe, that 
the ancient adorers of leeks and onions, or the present 
worshippers of the Grand Lama, came into the world 
predisposed to superstition; that the Turk is naturally 


THE DOCTRINE OP TEMPERAMENTS. 


5 


given to stern composure and faith in the power of 
destiny; that the Siamese commoner does, as it were, 
of himself cringe and fall on his knees before the 
absurd nobility of his country; and that the de¬ 
scendant of the Pilgrims, whether on the banks of 
the Detroit, the Iowa, or the Oregon, has the true 
instinct for liberty. As to speech, the infant in the val¬ 
ley of the Euphrates inherits, it jjpay not be doubted, 
an aptness to learn the diffuse forms of its Oriental 
language; and on the borders of the Seine to prefer 
the dialect of Paris to the deeper accents of the 
Germans. Though a man may have acquired a foreign 
language in his infancy, his thoughts were not des¬ 
tined by nature to flow in it; and perfect success in 
the use of words is obtained only in the mother 
tongue. 

The differences in national character are obvious, 
when we hold up in contrast the manners and history 
of nations. It is still easier to observe the traits which 
mark families. The father’s lineaments and consti¬ 
tution, the mother’s temper, re-appear in their off¬ 
spring. The child bears the features of its parents, 
and how often is the analogous resemblance of mind and 
tastes perceptible. 

And lastly, the life of every person has, from its 
commencement, its own peculiarities. Prom the first 
dawn of consciousness it is distinguished from that of 
every other intelligent being; and it contains within 



6 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


itself, the principles which are to decide on character, 
condition, and happiness. 

It appears then, from its race, its age, its nation, its 
family, and its own organization, the infant receives 
with its existence peculiar qualities. If it be asked, 
in what these original differences consist, we might 
safely invite the reader to consider for himself each 
class, under which we have arranged them, and test our 
statement by its application to individual cases. This 
would be attended with no difficulty as far as regards 
the three first sources of difference. Where men are 
to be judged of by comparing them in masses, whether 
of races or of peoples, and centuries of national existence 
are to be grouped together for the convenience of 
observing, it may be easy to seize on characteristics 
which stand out in bold relief. But it is in the daily 
walks of life, that a proper discrimination becomes both 
difficult and invaluable. It is in comparing family with 
family, and man with man, that an almost endless variety 
seems to baffie every effort at classification. 

But the subject has been happily reduced to order. 
It is found possible to analyze the ingredients, which 
compose the physical, and influence the moral nature; 
and thus to arrive at comparatively a small number 
of elements, which, by then: various combinations, 
produce the infinite diversity existing between indi¬ 
viduals. The ancients already estabhshed the simple 
classification of men according to their organization. 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


7 


and with the happy sagacity, for which they are justly 
considered eminent, invented the doctrine of temper¬ 
aments ; a doctrine, in itseK neither unimportant nor 
uninteresting; of high moment to the physician in the 
treatment of disease, and not without its advantages to 
any one in the care of his health; a doctrine which 
holds a conspicuous place in physiological science ; and 
forms a fit object of hberal curiosity, as belonging in 
general to the history and knowledge of man. 

It is our purpose to expound this intricate sub- 
• ject. Every one who reads, may try the correctness 
of our views, by comparisons drawn from his own 
experience. Yet the observer will bear in mind, 
that the theory has to exhibit each temperament in 
its purity, unmixed and unmitigated; life generally 
furnishes only examples, in which one or the other is 
strongly predominant. It is our duty, in order to draw 
the lines of separation between opposite classes, to pre¬ 
sent the peculiar quahties in a strong and distinct fight. 
Nature blends them in harmonious combinations. 


THE SANGUINEOUS TEMPERAMENT. 

The temperament, which in its external appearance, 
claims the highest degree of physical beauty, is the san¬ 
guineous. Its forms are moulded by nature to perfect 
symmetry, and invested with a complexion of the 
clearest lustre. The hands of the artist have embodied 





8 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


its outlines in tlie majestically graceful Apollo of the 
Vatican. Its delicate shape is “the dream of love.” 
A mild and clear eye promptly reveals the emotions of 
the heart; the veins swell with copious and healthful 
streams; and the cheek is quick to mantle with the 
crimson current. The breath of life is inhaled freely; 
the chest is high and expanded like that of “ a young 
Mohawk warrior; ” the pulse is active but gentle; the 
hair light; the skin soft and moist; the face unclouded; 
and, in short, the whole organization is characterized by 
the vigor and facility of its functions. 

The moral character of those who belong to this 
temperament is equally pleasing. They are amiable 
companions, every where welcome, and requiting the 
kindness shown them by gentleness of temper and 
elegance of manners. They are distinguished for play¬ 
fulness of fancy and ready wit. Their minds are rapid 
in their conceptions, and pass readily from one subject 
to another, so that they can change at once from gaiety 
to tears, or from gravity to mirth. Of a happy mem¬ 
ory, a careless and unsuspecting mien, a contented 
humor, a frank disposition, they fonn no schemes of 
deep hypocrisy or remote ambition. They are naturally 
affectionate, yet fickle in their friendships; prompt to 
act, yet uncertain of purpose. They excel in labors 
which demand a most earnest but short application. 
They conquer at a blow, or abandon the game. They 
gain their point by a coup de 7nain, never by a tedious 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


9 


siege. They are easily excited, but easily calmed; they 
take fire at a word, but are as ready to forgive. They 
dislike profound meditation, but excel in prompt. inge¬ 
nuity ; they succeed in fight exercises of fancy, in hap¬ 
pily contrasting incongruous objects, and inventing sin¬ 
gular but just comparisons. They are given to display, 
and passionately fond of being admired. Inconstant 
by nature, they are full of sympathy, and are eminently 
capable of transferring themselves in imagination into 
other scenes and conditions. Hence they sometimes 
are successful in the fighter branches of letters; but 
they are too little persevering to excel. A continuance 
of intellectual labor is odious to them; and in no case 
have they been known to unite the deep sentiments of 
philosophy to eloquent language. They are the gayest 
members of society, and yet the first to feel for others. 
With a thousand faults, their kindness of heart makes 
them always favorites. In their manners, they unite a 
happy audacity with winning good nature; their con¬ 
versation is gay, varied, and sparkling; never profound, 
but never dull; sometimes trivial, but often brilliant. 
Love is their ruling passion; but it is a frolic love, to 
which there are as many cynosures as stars. It is Ri- 
naldo in the chains, which he wifi soon break to submit 
to new ones. Occasionally they join in the contest for 
glory. In council they never have the ascendant; but 
of all executive officers they are the best. They often 
are thro^vn by some happy chance to be at the head of 




10 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


affairs; but they never retain power very long. They 
are sometimes even dehghted with camps; but the 
field of arms is for them only an afiair for a hohday; 
they go to battle as merrily as to a dance, and are soon 
weary of the one and the other. Life is to them a 
merry tale; if they are ever sad, it is but from com¬ 
passion or the love of change; and they breathe out 
their sighs chiefly in sonnets. Thus they seem made 
for sunshine and prosperity. Nature has given them 
/ the love of enjoyment, and blessed them with the gift 
of cheerfulness. In short, this temperament is to the 
rest, what youth is to the other periods of life; what 
spring is to the succeeding seasons; the time of fresh¬ 
ness and flowers, of elastic hope and unsated desire. 

Tor examples of this temperament, go to the abodes 
of the contented, the houses of the prosperous. Ask 
for the gayest among the gay in the scenes of pleasure ; 
search for those who have stilled the voice of ambition 
by the gentle influence of contented afiection. In the 
mythology of the ancients, among whom generally 
character stood forth in bolder relief, numerous illus¬ 
trations may be found. We may mention Paris, who, 
as the poet says, went to battle like the war-horse 
prancing to the river’s side, and who valued the safety 
of his country less than the gratification of his love; or 
Leander, whose passion the waters of the Hellespont 
could not quench; or the too fascinating Endymion, 
who drew Diana herself from her high career. In his- 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


11 


tory, we have the dangerous Alcibiades, who surpassed 
aU other Athenians in talent, the Spartans in self- 
denial, the Thracians in abandoned luxury; Mark An¬ 
tony, who, for a time, was the first man in Rome, but 
gave up the world for Cleopatra; Nero, the capricious 
tyrant, whose tomb was yet scattered with flowers; 
the Enghsh Leicester, for whom two queens contend¬ 
ed ; the gallant Hotspur of the British drama; the 
Trench duke de Richeheu; the good king Henry; the 
bold and amiable Trancis; or to take quite a recent 
example, the brave and gallant, but passionate and 
wavering Murat, now, in time of truce, displaying liis 
splendid dresses and his skill in horsemanship be¬ 
fore the admiring Cossacks, and anon in the season 
of strife, charging the enemy’s cavalry with fearless 
impetuosity. But we have the most striking illustra¬ 
tion of the sanguineous temperament, when uncon¬ 
trolled by moral principle, in the life and character of 
Demetrius, the famed besieger of cities. The son of 
Antigonus was tall, and of beautiful symmetry. Grace 
and majesty were united in his countenance; so that 
he inspired at once both affection and awe. In his 
hours of leisure, he was an agreeable profligate ; in his 
moments of action, no man equalled him in diligence 
and despatch. Like Bacchus, he was terrible in war, 
but in peace a voluptuary. At one time he hazards 
honor and hberty for the indulgence of his love; and 
at another, his presence of mind and his daring make 



12 


THE DOCTRINE OE TEMPERAMENTS. 


him victorious in the bloodiest naval battle of which 
any record exists. Though sometimes capriciously 
cruel, he was natm^ally humane. By turns a king 
and a pensioner, a hero and a profligate, a tyrant and 
a liberator, he conquered Ptolemy, besieged Thebes, 
gave freedom to Athens, was acknowledged to be the 
most active warrior of his age, and yet died in cap¬ 
tivity, of indolence and gluttony. 

Plutarch’s life of Demetrius Poliorcetes might in¬ 
deed be called the adventures of a sanguineous man, 
but of one morally abandoned. ^Ahere men of this 
temperament are distinguished for blamelessness and 
purity, they comprise within themselves all that is 
lovely and amiable in human nature. They are the 
fondest husbands and the kindest fathers. They live 
in an atmosphere of happiness. The fables of Arcadia 
seem surpassed by realities. It is especially in early 
life that their virtues have the most pleasing fragrance; 

severe in youthful beauty,” they are like the Israelites, 
who would not eat of the Eastern king’s meat, and yet 
had countenances fairer than all. These are they, of 
whom the poets praise the destiny which takes them 
early from the world. These are the favorites of 
heaven, who, if they live to grow old, at their death 
“ flU up one monument with goodness itself.” 

With regard to the preservation of health, we sum 
up every precept for the sanguineous man in this one; 
avoid excess. He should take much active, but not 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


13 


violent exercise ; and must be careful to diminish the 
tendency to plethora. He may dance, may fence, may 
indulge in field-sports, or use any of the exercises of a 
well instituted gymnasium ; but all moderately. Na¬ 
ture has made him prone to indulgence, but has. made 
indulgence doubly dangerous for his constitution and 
his morals. We repeat it: let him avoid excess, and 
his life will pass away in uninterrupted cheerfulness, in 
deeds of courtesy and benevolence, in the habitual 
exercise of the gentle and the generous virtues. 

THE ATHLETIC TEMPERAMENT. 

The athletic temperament possesses in some re¬ 
spects the external appearance of the sanguineous; but 
it rises to a colossal stature, and is possessed of extra¬ 
ordinary strength. It implies an excess of muscular 
force over the sensitive. In superior physical powers, it 
loses all playfulness of mind. The atliletic ipan has 
great vigor of frame, but is of an inactive spirit. He 
never attains to elevated purposes, or a fixed character; 
he has no acuteness or insight into human motives, no 
gift of eloquence or poetry. He can be made an in¬ 
strument in the hands of others, but never of himself 
conceives vast enterprises. He is good-humored, and by 
coaxing and fiattery may be persuaded to do or suffer 
almost any thing; but if his passions are excited, 
he is capable of becoming ferocious, and even brutal. 






14 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


The sanguineous man often becomes athletic by a 
course of exercise, fitted to give the greatest develop¬ 
ment to the animal nature. 

The mythology of the ancients furnishes examples 
of this class, in the whole race of the Titans, who 
thought in their folly that they could scale heaven, 
because their mighty arms could rend mountains from 
their bases. But the best instance among the demi¬ 
gods is Hercules. The brawny hero was perpetually 
cozened by Eurystheus, was compelled to execute the 
most frightful labors, tmmed rivers from their courses, 
withdrew the dead from the world of shades, and 
struck terror into the powers of Orcus, and yet was 
the slave of his appetites, and the dupe of his mistress. 
In all this he shows the excess of force and its con¬ 
comitant mental imbecility. 

If we turn to real life for illustrations, it must be 
remembered, that this temperament rarely fills the 
high offices of power and trust. The historic muse 
names of it no one among the benefactors of mankind. 
Had we the annals of the amphitheatres of old, we 
could know what giant son of the human race had 
worn the highest honors for prodigies of strength. 
In the unsettled period of the Homan empire, there 
are not wanting instances of men, who gained the 
diadem by being the strongest of those that joined 
in the scramble, or won the hearts of the barbarian 
legions, by excelling in the barbarian virtue of mere 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


15 


physical force. There was too, quite recently, a Saxon 
elector, or rather a Pohsh king, who could break a 
horse shoe though he could not govern a kingdom, 
and was more successful in his debaucheries, than 
in acquiring the respect of men. He pretended to 
be an amateur of the fine arts, when he really under¬ 
stood nothing but the chase. He left the government 
of Saxony to his minister and yet believed he did 
every thing himself; he found the Poles troublesome 
to manage and therefore abandoned them to anarchy; 
the capital of his hereditary dominions was menaced by 
the Prussians; he fied taking with him his pictures 
and his porcelain, but leaving to the conqueror the 
archives of the state. Every body knows the story 
of his father, August Frederic, the second of the 
name. He sold his fine regiment of dragoons to his 
most dangerous neighbor, for twelve porcelain vases. 
Once his mortal enemy Charles the Twelfth of Sweden, 
in the strangest freak, came unexpectedly and unattend¬ 
ed to breakfast with him in Dresden; some hours after 
the king had rejoined his army, Augustus held a coun¬ 
cil to consider whether he ought not to have detained 
his royal guest as a prisoner. 

In republics, this atliletic temperament can have no 
chance to gain power; it is only by divine right, or the 
favor of a female ruler, that it can hope to control the 
fortunes of states. The study of history leads us to cry 
out against the injustice of history; it is a mere accident, 


16 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


whether genuine worth finds a place there. Phihp, the 
landgrave of Hesse, was a great friend of Protestant¬ 
ism. He also begged of Luther leave to have two wives 
at once. This was a strange request from a Christian 
prince to a reformer of religion; but Luther decided 
the request to be a reasonable one. Philip was always 
for prompt measures; he struck a bold blow, or none. 
Finding war too troublesome, he left the business to 
others, and gave himself up to slothful indulgence. 
If his end seems inconsistent with his earlier years, the 
riddle is solved by a word; he was of the athletic tem¬ 
perament. Indeed the whole family of Hessian princes 
has had a tendency to that class. Frederic, the second 
of the line, was fond of splendor; and not famous for 
nice feeling. He sold his soldiers at a high rate. 
England paid him more than twenty-one millions of 
rix dollars for twelve thousand of them, for eight 
years. Why is it worse for an African prince to dis¬ 
pose of the captives whom he takes in war, to cultivate 
sugar and cotton in America, than for a Hessian 
prince to sell his own subjects, of whom he has 
the divine right to be the parent and the sovereign, 
to fight the battles of England, and be shot at for less 
than sixpence a day ? The son of the Landgrave just 
mentioned, was one of the richest and meanest misers 
in Europe, the most tyrannical petty despot of his time. 
Inventing a new right of primogeniture, he promulga¬ 
ted a law respecting those who were permitted to be 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


17 


educated, and allowed the clergy generally, and some 
public functionaries of a certain rank, to educate only 
their oldest son. We connect with a prince, at least 
some ideas of external splendor, and liberahty of dis¬ 
position. But what shall we think of this niggardly au¬ 
tocrat, who fumbled in the pockets of the poor man in 
quest of his last penny, and raked the barren sands of 
an exhausted soil for a few more grains of gold ? 

The most remarkable of all liistorical personages of 
the athletic temperament, was Potemkin, for several 
years the unlimited favorite of Catharine. Por a while 
men thought him possessed of a colossal genius; but 
he had nothing colossal except his body. He had no 
character, and soon made it evident. What mighty 
events spring froin petty causes! An inferior officer 
saw the empress display herself in uniform before the 
guards; her sword was without tassels; he tore his 
own from the hilt, to make her an offering of them; 
she accepted the tribute, and became enamored of 
his person; and he made himself her master. The 
chancellor of the empire outwitted liim; so that the 
armed neutrahty was the result of a court intrigue. 
His mind was of the coarsest order. “How many 
prostitutes are there in Petersburg!! ? ’’ said she to him 
one day. “ Porty thousand,’’ replied he, “ without the 
court.” He was excessively grasping and excessively 
prodigal. He was worth thirty-five milhons of our 
dollars, and yet could not be induced to pay a trades- 
2 


18 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


man’s bill. Catharine lavished on him immense sums; 
he would further forge checks in her name on the pub¬ 
lic treasury, and accept bribes from foj^ign powers. 
The first division of Poland was to him but ‘‘ child’s 
play.” When the Tartars of the Crimea hesitated to 
take the oath of allegiance to Catharine, he ordered 
thirty thousand of them to be slaughtered in a mass, 
men, women and children. The grand riband of the 
order of St. George is given in Russia, only to a com- 
mander-in-chief, after a victory. To gain this, he 
quarrelled with the Porte in 1787, and in the next 
year, took Otchakow by storm, in spite of sickness and 
scarcity. He surpassed all men of his tune in prodi¬ 
gality, in meanness, in sensual indulgence, and capri¬ 
cious vanity. He died at last, in consequence of his 
excesses, under a tree by the road-side; and when 
Paul came to the croTO, the body of Potemkin was 
thrown into a ditch. 

Such is the athletic temperament. Its excess of 
health and strength is by no means desirable. When 
the constitution once begins to fail, it is broken up 
suddenly and rapidly. And there is really less of the 
true vital principle in this temperament, than in any 
other. Those who belong to it never acquue eminent 
intellectual distinction; and are ignorant of refined 
sensations. No prayers, no sacrifices, no exertions, 
not even nightly vigils, can open for them the sanctu¬ 
ary of the muse. Heaven has conferred on them a 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


19 


majestic frame, but doomed them to perpetual medioc¬ 
rity. The athletic man can receive few rules for the 
regulation ^ his health. Indeed, Hippocrates pro¬ 
nounces his usual condition to be a state of malady. 
We can only exhort him to be temperate, and to use 
his strength with, discretion. His life will probably not 
extend to old age, and 'will be exposed to many in¬ 
firmities. 

In history, this temperament has gained distinction 
in the troublesome times, when brutal force and fierce 
indifference were in the ascendant. In poetry, it is 
illustrated by the Ajax of Homer, and we have an accu¬ 
rate description of it in Chaucer. 

‘‘ The MiUer was a stout carl for the nones. 

Fill bigge he was of braun, and eke of bones ; 
That proved wel, for over all ther he came. 

At 'wrastling he wold here away the ram. 

He was short shuldered, brode, a thikke gnarre, 
Ther n’as no dore, that he n’olde heve of baiTe, 

Or breke it at a renning with his hede.” 

THE BILIOUS TEMPERAMENT. 

We turn to the consideration of a class of men, to 
whom the destinies of the world are generally commit¬ 
ted; who rule in the cabinet and on the exchange; 
who control public business, and guide the deliber¬ 
ations of senates, and who, whether in exalted or pri¬ 
vate stations, unite in the highest degree instant saga- 


20 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


city with persevering energy. They possess, like the 
sanguineous, quickness of perception and rapidity of 
thought; but they at the same time have the power of 
confining their attention to a single object. They have 
good practical judgment; they see things as they are, 
and are never deceived by contemplating measures in a 
false fight; they have a clear eye to pierce the secrets 
of the human heart, to read the character and under¬ 
stand the motives of others. They are patient and in¬ 
dexible in their purposes; and however remote may be 
the aim of their desires, they labor with unwearied toil 
even for a distant and apparently uncertain success. 
They are prone to anger, and yet can moderate or 
conceal their indignation. Their strongest passion is 
ambition; all other emotions yield to it; even love 
vainly struggles against it; and if they sometimes give 
way to beauty, they in their pleasures resemble the 
Scythians of old, who at their feasts used to strike the 
cords of their bows, to remind themselves of danger. 
The men of whom we are speaking are urged by con¬ 
stant restlessness to constant action. An habitual sen¬ 
timent of disquietude allows them no peace but in the 
tumult of business; the hours of crowded life are the 
only ones they value; the narrow road of emulation 
the only one in which they travel. 

These moral characteristics are observed to be con¬ 
nected with a form more remarkable for firmness than 
for grace. The complexion is generally not light; and 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


21 


not unfrequently of a saUow hue; the hail’ is dark; the 
skin dry; the flesh not abundant, but Ann; the mus¬ 
cular force great in proportion to the volume of the 
muscles; the eye vivid and sparkhng. The appetite is 
voracious rather than dehcate; the digestion rapid. 
Of the internal organs, the hver is proportionably the 
largest and the most active; and its copious secretions 
give a name to the class. 

Such is the nature of those who belong to the 
bilious temperament. They are to be employed, 
wherever hardiness of resolution, prompt decision, 
and permanence of enterprise are required. They 
unite in themselves in an eminent degree the manly 
virtues, which lead to results in action. At their birth 
aU the gods came to ofier gifts; the graces alone re¬ 
mained away. They stand high in the calendar of courts, 
and know how to court the favor of the citizens of re¬ 
publics; but Cupid, indignant at then’ independence 
of him, degrades them in his calendar. They do not 
reign in the world of fashion, and the novel-writer 
could make an Oxenstiern or a Sully an imposing 
picture, but not the hero of a sentimental tale. 

Will you learn from living examples, what is the 
natm-e of the bilious temperament? Walk to the 
exchange, and ask who best understands the daring 
business of insurance ? Discover by whom the banks 
are managed which give the surest and largest divi¬ 
dends? Go to our new settlements in the west, 


22 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


and mark the men who are early and late riding 
through the majestic forests of virgin nature, where 
the progress is impeded, it is true, by no under¬ 
wood, but where every hardship must be endured, 
streams forded, nights be spent under the open sky, 
hunger be defied, and a thousand dangers be braved 
by the keen speculator, who will take nothing on trust. 
Or watch the arena of public strife, and see who it is, 
that most skilfully, and yet most secretly, touches the 
springs of national action, and controls the distribution 
of praise and emoluments in the very court of honor ? 

Or if you will not trust yourself with scrutinizing 
the motives of the living, consult the Muse of History, 
and with her trumpet tongue, she will tell you of those 
who are the elect of her heart, those who fill the uni¬ 
verse with their fame, and have swayed their times by 
thek prowess and their mental power; from the mighty 
conquerors of earliest antiquity, whose names float to 
us among the wrecks of unknown empires, to the last 
wonderful man, who, in our own times, dealt with 
states as with playthings, and, by the force of his des¬ 
potic will, shook the civilized world to its centre. 

Ancient history furnishes perhaps no more exact 
illustration of this temperament, than in the charac¬ 
ter of Themistocles. In his boyhood he shunned 
boyish sports; but would compose declamations and 
harangues. He says of himself, that he had learnt 
neither to tune the harp nor handle the lyre, but that 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


23 


lie knew how to make a small and inglorious city both 
poMrerful and illustrious. He could not sleep for the 
trophies of MUtiades. When his superior in the com¬ 
mand raised a staff to repel disagreeable advice by a 
blow, he coolly said, “ Strike—but hear me,” rendering 
patience sublime by his patriotism. Having been a 
poor and disinherited child, he made his way to the 
highest honors in Athens, and for a season controlled 
the civilized world. “ He was the first of men,” says 
Thucydides, “for practical judgment.” Of Romans 
we might name as of the bilious temperament, the 
elder Brutus, the glorious hypocrite, who hid the power 
of his genius till he could exert it for liberty. The 
greatest foreigner in the days of the Repubhc on the 
Roman soil was Hannibal, and he, not less than Julius 
Caesar, was of the bihous class. 

But were we to select an example among those, 
who at any time have been masters of the Seven Hills, 
we should name the wonderful Montalto, Pope Sextus 
V. In early life he exerted astonishing industiy and 
talent, made himself the favorite preacher in the cities 
of Italy, and afterwards won the hearts of the Spaniards, 
till he was at last made Cardinal. Then of a sudden 
his character seemed changed; and for almost twenty 
years he played the part of a deceiver, with unequalled 
skill. He lived at a retired house, kept few servants, 
was liberal in his expenses for charities, but parsimo¬ 
nious tow^ards himself; contradicted no one; submitted 


24 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


even to insults with perfect good humor; and, in short, 
acquired the reputation of being the most meek, the 
most humble, and the most easily guided among the 
cardinals. Of the forty-two cardinals who entered the 
conclave, Montalto seemed nearest to another world. 
A crutch supported the declining strength of his old 
age; and a distressing cough indicated that life was fast 
consuming away. Six parties divided the assembly; 
and fourteen cardinals deemed themselves worthy of 
the tiara. On balloting, Albano, the most powerfully 
supported, had but thirteen votes. Let us take this 
good natured, dying old man, thought they; he will be 
easily managed; and four parties of the six united for 
Montalto. The ballot was ended; “ Gods ! I am Pope 
of Rome,’’ exclaimed the hale old man. Casting from 
him the cloaks in which he was muffled, he threw his 
crutch across the room, and bending back, spit to 
the ceding of the high chamber of the Vatican in 
which he was, to show the vigor of his lungs. Never 
did a wiser man hold the keys of St. Peter. He pun¬ 
ished vice even in the high places, with inexorable sever¬ 
ity ; he established the library of the Vatican; placed the 
magnificent obelisk in front of St. Peters; caused the 
matchless cupola to be built; conducted water to the 
Quirinal Hill; erected a vast hospital for the poor; 
made the splendid street, called from his name Pelice; 
reformed the finances of the states of the Church; 
and, while he exercised great influence on the affairs of 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


25 


Christendom, he himself kept at peace. Since his 
time, the Catholic Church has not had at its head 
a man of superior genius. 

In the care of his health the bilious man has no 
excess of humors that require to be dissipated by vio¬ 
lent exercise. He may use almost any kind of motion 
in a moderated degree. In summer he must avoid fa¬ 
tiguing labors during the heat of the day. Autumn is 
the best season for him; especially when the air is at 
once cool and moist. Then in the midst of nature's 
decline he forms projects for his own advancement; 
nor does he always pause, though his path to success 
may lead through the ruin of others. 


THE PHLEGMATIC TEMPERAMENT. 

There are men, not absolutely dull, yet not of lively 
sensibility; their thoughts are exact, but neither very 
gay, nor very profound; their ideas come tardily, but 
with precision; they are quiet; not disposed to anger; 
and in general, pursue a middle course. They are 
fond of repose, and, if left to themselves, would sleep 
away a large part of their lives. These men are* of a 
light and often delicate complexion; the countenance 
is without expression; the eye tranquil; the hair of no 
decided color; the muscles of great volume, but feeble; 
the pulse mild, and disappearing under a firm pressure. 
The fibres are soft; the humors of the body aboimd. 


26 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


Such are the characteristics, moral and physical, of the 
phlegmatic, or, as it is often called, the lymphatic tem¬ 
perament. 

The phlegmatic man is tranquil in all his affections; 
he is never troubled with desperate love. As he pos¬ 
sesses neither enterprise nor sudden resolution, he 
avoids undertakings wherein those qualities would be 
necessary. He cultivates, or rather seems naturally to 
possess, the qualities of prudence and discretion. His 
conduct is free from excesses; and his vices and virtues 
are stamped with mediocrity. He easily acquires es¬ 
teem, and never excites admiration. He is not tor¬ 
mented by ambition, or a thirst for praise; neither is 
he exposed to the temptations which most frequently 
and most dangerously beset the weaknesses of others. 
But let him not be proud of this imagined superiority. 
He purchases his distinction by foregoing the highest 
pleasures of the imagination and the most delicate 
enjoyments of existence. Unfit for acting in sudden 
emergencies, he succeeds perfectly well in labors which 
chiefly require patience, where gradual advancement is 
the result of moderate but continued efforts. Hence 
he is sure to be jostled from the road to influence in 
times of high excitement; and never possesses power 
but in seasons of profound tranquillity. It is with 
great surprise that we find a late popular writer quote 
the illustrious Box, as an illustration of the phleg¬ 
matic temperament. Box was given to pleasure as well 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


27 


as to business; he had taste, philanthropy, warm feel¬ 
ings, impetuous daring, many of the most honorable 
qualities of the sanguineous man. The British minis¬ 
ters of greatest note, from Lord Burleigh to Cannmg, 
were generally of the bihous temperament. But if we 
must give a great name as an example of this class, 
we should take the philosopher and historian Hume. 
The Dutch are nationally of this organization. It 
would not seem to suit the character of a poet; but 
Thomson w^as a phlegmatic man, “ more fat than bard 
beseems,’’ though youthful admirers may find it diffi¬ 
cult to reconcile this opinion with their idea of the poet 
of the Seasons. Take these lines as proof of his nature: 

“ But first the fuel’d chimney blazes wide; 

The tankards foam; and the strong table groans 
Beneath the smoking sirloin, stretched immense 
From side to side, in which, with desperate knife. 
They deep incision make.” 

And when he compares the steam of hot punch to the 
breath of IMay as it comes over violets, and praises the 
ale which is 

“ not afraid. 

E’en with the vineyard’s best produce to vie,” 
the verses, on the whole, are as barbarous in their 
measm'e as they are plilegmatic in their conception. 

No exercise is too violent for the man of this tem¬ 
perament. His sleeping energies must be awakened; 
his imagination roused from its lethargy by powerful 


28 


THE DOCTRINE OE TEMPERAMENTS. 


excitement. In summer, to guard against his natural 
lassitude, let him rise in time to help Hyperion to his 
horse; and quicken his system by a cold bath; then, 
careless of the heat, he may plunge into the forest and 
pursue the chase, till real fatigue gives him a claim to 
repose. In winter he may run at full speed till his 
heavy frame pants for breath; or wrestle violently 
with an equal antagonist till his chill blood flows 
warmly to his cheek. Nor need he shun the social 
circle and the festive dance. The society of the gay 
will not undermine his gravity, and the noise of mirth 
and the sight of beauty wiU never be too stimulating 
for his sluggish passions. 


THE MELANCHOLIC TEMPERAMENT. 

Observe the pensive man, who stands musing apart 
from the rest, and whom we should think bilious but 
for the compression of his chest. His countenance is 
pallid or sallow; and his features are expressive of 
melancholy. He is lean, yet of great muscular vigor; 
his eyes are clear and brilliant, yet of a sombre expres¬ 
sion. His hair is dark, and does not readily curl. He 
is rather tall, and not ill-formed, yet slender; his breast 
is narrow, and confines the play of his lungs; he 
stoops as he sits or walks. His internal organization is 
marked by energy and life; but the action of the sys¬ 
tem meets with obstructions. His nerves are extremely 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


29 


sensitive; yet generous warmth is wanting to mollify 
and expand their extremities. His blood circulates 
with languor, and if he is long exposed to the cold in a 
state of inactivity, it is soon chilled. His stomach is 
apt to become indolent; he is liable to the anguish of 
difficult digestion. Such are the physical peculiarities 
of the melancholic temperament. 

The man of this class unites an habitual distrust of 
himself and weak indecision in common affairs, with 
obstinate persistence in matters on which he is decided, 
and undaunted perseverance in pursuing one object. 
When he has no strong motive to fix him, his wavering 
exposes him to the reproach of pusillanimity; and he 
might find it difficult to repel the charge, were it not 
that it is impossible to make him swerve from a purpose 
once adopted. Beauty has an inconceivable and mys¬ 
terious power over him. He deserts the society of the 
wise and learned, the disputes of politicians and the dis¬ 
cussions of men of business, for the unquiet enjoyment 
which he finds in its vicinity. Yet while he yields to 
the temporary infiuence and dominion of any one who 
is lovely, he is slow to form an attachment; and if his 
affections are once engaged, his love bears the seal of 
eternity. In his intercourse with men, he avoids all 
society which does not suit his habits of mind; but he 
is sincere in his friendships, and, we must also add, 
slow to forgive an injury. The recollection of a wrong 
remains imprinted almost indelibly on his memory. In 


30 


THE DOCTRINE OE TEMPERAMENTS. 


society his manners are embarrassed and often awk¬ 
ward ; yet he does not fail to excite interest and a sen¬ 
timent akin to compassion. When he converses, his 
imagination exerts itself powerfully, and he often uses 
original and singularly expressive forms of language. 
Indeed the imagination is at ah times the strongest 
faculty of his mind. It creates a world for him, ah 
unlike the real one. He does not see things as they 
are, but beholds in them only the reflections of his own 
representations. His delight is in profound sentiment, 
and he excels in the delineation of strong passions and 
intense suffering. Powerful motives are required to 
bring him to action. If suddenly cahed upon, when 
he is not moved, he falters; can decide on nothing; 
and appears to exhibit a complete inefficiency and un¬ 
suitableness for business. But if strong excitement ac¬ 
companies the unexpected summons, he comes with 
energy and decision to the guidance of affairs, pours 
forth his ideas in a torrent of extraordinary and irre¬ 
sistible eloquence, and surpasses ah expectation. It is 
a weakness of the melanchohc man, that he is always 
contemplating himself; the operations of his own mind, 
the real, or more probably, the imaginary woes of his 
own experience. The sanguineous man is happy in his 
fickleness; the bhious enjoys himself in the stir of 
action; the phlegmatic is content, if he is but left alone 
to repose undisturbed ; the melancholic is quite satis¬ 
fied only when discoursing, or musing on himself and 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


31 


his sorrows. So far he is liable to the charge of vanity; 
but no fiuiher. He does not form too high an estimate 
of himself; self-conceit is the-peculiar foible of the san¬ 
guineous. Love is the ruling passion of the sangui¬ 
neous ; ambition of the bilious; the melancholy man is 
haunted by a longing for glory. This gives an impulse 
to his patriotism; this kindles his imagination and leads 
him to beautiful designs; tliis prompts him to enter on 
the career of letters; this not unfrequently drives him 
Avith irresistible power to nightly vigils and immode¬ 
rate toil, in the hope to enshrine his name among the 
immortal. He is timid, and his fastidious taste is 
never satisfied with what he performs, though of all 
men he can least brook censure; so that he exhibits 
the apparent contradiction of relying most obstinately 
on a judgment Avhich he himself distrusts. This diffi¬ 
dence of himself may at first seem to injure the perfec¬ 
tion and utility of his labors. But his doubting makes 
him anxious to finish his productions in the most care- 
fid manner. To what else do we owe the perfect grace 
and harmony of Virgil ? the compact expression and 
polished elegance of Gray ? 

If the melancholic man errs in his practical estimate 
of men, he at least studies the principles according to 
Avhich they act, and carefully analyzes their motives 
and passions. He understands the internal operations 
of their minds, even while he is unsuccessful in his 
direct attempts at infiuencing them. He is himself 


32 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


capable of a high and continued enthusiasm. Gifted 
with affections which may be refined and elevated, he 
can feel admiration for all that is beautiful and un¬ 
selfish among men; can pay homage to the fine arts ; 
or be admitted to enjoy the serious pleasures afforded 
by philosophy and poetry. He has no talent for light 
humor and pleasantry ; but he excels in bitter retorts 
and severity of satire. He is subject to ecstasies of 
pleasure no less than of pain ; and the former become 
him less than the latter. He possesses the virtue of 
patience in the most eminent degree. Nothing can 
fatigue or subdue him. Disappointments do not weary 
him, nor can he be baffled by delay. 

The history of literature and the arts is full of ex¬ 
amples of this temperament; on the world also, it has 
frequently exercised a wide and lasting influence. The 
most eloquent of modern philosophers, the gifted child 
of Geneva, the outcast of fortune, offers an illustration. 
How brilliant is his imagination! What timidity 
marks his character in smaller afiPairs ! What daunt¬ 
less courage animated him, when he published truths 
in defiance of the Roman Church and the ven¬ 
geance of despots ! What a power also was exercised 
over him by beauty! How willingly he offers his 
Eloise in manuscript, on gilt-edged paper, neatly 
sewed with ribands, to his accomplished patroness 1 
What ignorance of the world do we find in him, and 
yet what discriminating delineations of the passions and 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


33 


hearts of men! So long as a love of truth, of hberty, 
of virtue, shall avail with charity to mitigate the con¬ 
demnation of vices, which a defect of education may 
paUiate but not excuse ; so long as splendor of imagina¬ 
tion, keen reasoning, eloquent reproofs of fashionable 
follies and crimes, in a word, the fine thoughts and 
style of genius, shall be admired,* the name and the 
writings of Rousseau will be remembered, and the ana¬ 
lysis of his mind explain the organization wliich we are 
describing. 

In Enghsh poetry, Cowley seems to have been of 
this temperament. Milton, originally bihous, acquired 
something of it from age and misfortunes. It was 
natural to the bard of Mantua; it threw the thick 
cloud of self-torturing gloom over the poet of chivalry 
and the cross, the sweetest minstrel of his country, 
or rather of aU time, the inimitable Tasso. 

These are instances of men devoted to letters. 
History describes Demosthenes as of a slender form 
and short breath; therefore, we infer, of a narrow 
chest. His physiognomy has a gloomy expression, as 
we know not only from the busts of him, but from the 
insolent jests of ^schines. He is represented as of 
unyielding fixedness of purpose ; a man, whom neither 
the factions of the people, nor the clamors of the aris¬ 
tocratic party, nor the gold of Macedonia, could move 
from the career of disinterested patriotism. Arriving 
at early manhood, he found an object worthy of the 
3 


34 


THE DOCTRINE OE TEMPERAMENTS. 


employment of his life, and remained true to it in dan¬ 
ger, in power, in success, in defeat,—at home, on em¬ 
bassies, in exile, and in death. He was an ardent lover 
of hberty, smitten also with a true passion for glory. 
Moreover in spite of his perseverance, he was naturally 
timid. When he was presented at the court of Philip, 
he is said to have been embarrassed, and to have 
shown no proofs of his greatness. When called from 
the forum to the camp, he was not at once capable of 
directing the battle. He was accustomed never to 
address the Athenians except after careful preparation; 
yet, on great occasions, he was sometimes raised 
beyond himself, and if excited and compelled to speak, 
he did it as it were by inspiration, and with irresisti¬ 
ble force. AU these things are traits of the melancholic 
temperament. 

We think we are abundantly authorized by his¬ 
torical evidence in these remarks on Demosthenes; 
though, as far as our knowledge extends, he is cited 
in none of the books of physiology. To this class 
we venture to add the name of one still more glorious 
in human annals, and we do it confidently, relying on 
the portraits of his person and his moral character. 
It is the illustrious mariner to whom this country has 
recently paid high honors, by the pen of Washington 
Irving. We mean Christopher Columbus, who was 
inspired by the innate majesty of his own soul, to sail 
so far into an unknown hemisphere. 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


35 


“ Ch’ appena seguira con gli occhi il volo 
La Pama, ch’ ha mille occhi, e mille penne. 

Canta ella Alcide, e Bacco, e di te solo, 

Basti a i posteri tiioi ch’ alquanto accenne; 

Che quel poco da a liinga memoria 
Di poema dignissima, e d’ istoria.” 

Thus we see, that persons of the melanchohc tem¬ 
perament, possess great means of influencing others, 
and exercising power over the destinies of mankind. 
In our account of it, we have purposely avoided men¬ 
tioning the monstrous crimes, which are described by 
Cabanis, Richerand, and other physiologists, as its 
natural efiects. They are not so. Providence has 
made no temperament morally evil or good. It has 
exposed each to its own temptations, and facihtated to 
each the acquisition of virtues. The rashness of the 
sanguineous is counteracted by humanity and the softer 
virtues; the ambition of the bihous by clear reason and 
a quick perception of what is just; the weakness of the 
melancholic by patience and unwearied application. 
But it must be confessed that when they become cor¬ 
rupt, their vices may produce very difierent degrees of 
horror. The bilious man is never wantonly cruel or 
wicked. Caesar, in his ambition, finished the ruin of 
his country’s liberties, but his success was not sulhed 
by bloody vengeance. Nero, who was sanguineous, 
was at first humane, then fickle, then corrupt, and 
when his innocence was gone, he made men miserable 
for his amusement. Vengeance is the crime of the 


36 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


melancholic. Witness the proscriptions of Sylla. 
When the melancholic man surrenders^ himself to 
the influence of mahgnant or degrading passions, 
he is cold and merciless; his imagination is full of 
corrupt images; his lusts are unnatural; his breast 
conceives dark and hateful designs; he becomes in¬ 
different to consequences; he neither respects the hap¬ 
piness of others nor is awed by the prospect of his own 
ruin; he is deaf to the voice of humanity, reckless of 
nature, of God, and of eternity. Tiberius, Domitian, 
Philip II. of Spain; these are examples,—^would there 
were no more,—^that the melancholic temperament may 
be ruinous to public happiness. The mind turns gladly 
from these men of atrocious souls, to the milder virtues 
and the better genius of Burke or the elder Pitt. 

Let the melanchohc man, if he values health of 
body, or mental peace, never yield to indolence, and 
shun sohtude when his fancy begins to brood darkly 
over his cares. His diet should be rich, moderate in 
quantity, but nutritious. Pasting, or a low fare, 
might give his passions a tragical power. Light wines 
he may freely use. In winter, if he will but be often 
abroad, the cold weather will call off his thoughts from 
his troubles. Sufficient exercise by day, and cheerful 
company in the evening, will keep him in a good con¬ 
dition. Summer is the dangerous season for him. The 
solitary admiration of nature confirms all his evils, 

“ Go, soft enthusiast! quit the cypress groves. 

Nor to the rivulet’s lonely moanings tune 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


37 


Your sad complaint. Go, seek the cheerful haunts 
Of men, and mingle with the bustling crowd"; 

Lay schemes pr wealth, for power, or fame, the wish 
/. Of nobler minds, and push them night and day. 

Or join the caravan in quest of scenes 
New to your eyes and shifting every hour. 

Beyond the Alps, beyond the Apennines. 

Or more adventurous, rush into the field 
Where war grows hot; and raging through the sky, 
The lofty trumpet swells the maddening soul.’* 

THE NERVOUS TEMPERAMENT. 

We have finished the enumeration of temperaments, 
as described by the fathers of medicine. The Greeks 
recognized but four, considering the athletic only as a 
modification of the sanguineous. Modem writers 
form a distinct class of the athletic, and they add 
another, of which examples doubtless existed among 
the ancients, and which in modem times embraces no 
inconsiderable portion of mankind. 

The temperament to which we allude is the ner¬ 
vous. We cannot readily give a type of its moral 
character, for a part of its peculiarity is, that it admits 
of the most various modifications. It is known by the 
predominance of the sensitive part of the system. It 
is not that the nerves are deranged, or delicate, or 
weak; on the contrary, the action of the nerves is dis- 


38 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


proportionately powerful; they do their office too 
effectually. 

The nervous temperament is marked by extreme 
sensibility. An impression is easily made; the mind 
is active and volatile; flying hastily from one subject 
and one feeling to another, not from flckleness, but 
from a rapidity of associations. It is quick in making 
combinations and forms its resolutions suddenly; but 
the durability of these resolutions depends on the 
texture of the fibres. If they are effeminate, the char¬ 
acter is fickle; if they are hard, and in man, this 
usually happens, the character is Arm and possessed of 
decision. In the latter case the nervous man is lean, 
and as it were emaciated; his muscles are compact; 
the eye bright and rapid. He is capable of the most 
diversified action. He can instantaneously break from 
deep devotion to give himself up to amusement, from 
sympathy with the sorrows of others to mix in gaiety. 
Sometimes he is distinguished in public speaking; 
but wit and sarcasm, frequent illustrations, abrupt 
transitions, are more natural to him than careful 
reasoning or impassioned eloquence. He is scarcely 
ever pathetic; but he excels in epigrammatic con¬ 
ceits, in the quick perception of the ludicrous, and 
in the pointed expression of his ideas. He dehghts 
in proverbs, and manufactures new ones. He is com¬ 
monly eccentric in his ways; and while he is fre¬ 
quently suspected of levity by the world, he retorts 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


39 


upon it by a 'cold philosophy, and a “ contempt for 
the mahgnant vulgar.” The people of Neufchatel 
dismissed their pastor, because he disbeheved in the 
eternity of future punishments. The pastor appealed 
to Trederic, who declined interference. “If,” said 
he, and it was his only and his formal answer,—“if 
the people of Neufchatel insist on being damned 
y for ever, I shall interpose no objections.” Frederic 
is the most striking example of the nervous tem¬ 
perament. Voltaire also .belonged to it. So too in 
the north, we have no hesitation in classing under 
it the Russian Suwarrow. In antiquity we think that 
Socrates was an instance of it; to the many he seemed 
an odd buffoon ; but his friends and pupils knew that 
his mind held glorious converse with the sublimest 
truths. We further venture the suggestion, that the 
eccentric apostate, the gifted Julian, possessed the 
traits of the nervous class. Were we to name two 
more, they should be the emperor Hadrian of Rome, 
and his counterpart, the emperor Joseph of Austria. 

Where tliis temperament exists in an intense de¬ 
gree, it beeomes a malady. Its remedy is exercise. 
The balance must be restored between the sensitive 
and the muscular forces; and this can be effected only 
by diminishing the action of the intellect and cultiva¬ 
ting that of the animal nature. Nothing else can give 
rest. Friendship, letters, business, action, all will 
not avail, or rather will but increase the evil. The 


40 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


labors of agriculture, or any labor abroad, which will 
gently occupy the thoughts, and at the same time 
strengthen the body, are of most service. Children 
of this class suffer from too early attempts to cultivate 
their minds. Such attempts are immediately followed 
by great apparent results, but do in fact confirm the 
natural weakness and misfortune of the individual. 

THE TEMPERED TEMPERAMENT. 

It win hardly be necessary to repeat, that these 
temperaments are seldom found unmixed, although 
one is usually predominant. In general it may be 
observed, that the sanguineous prevails at the north; 
the bihous at the south; the phlegmatic in cold and 
moist marshy countries. In our immediate vicinity, 
examples of the sanguineous occur more frequently 
than of any other. A mixture of the sanguineous 
and the bilious is very common, and forms the tem¬ 
perament best suited for the faithful and tranquil dis¬ 
charge of private duties. The melanchohc is also not 
rare; the nervous is uncommon, except in the other 
sex; busy America does not produce decided cases 
enough of the phlegmatic to bring them into the 
account. 

And which is the best temperament ? Each is 
content with itself. The bilious man thinks no hours 
worth remembering, except those which have been 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


41 


passed in the midst of ambitious toil. But do you think 
that the sanguineous will desert his pleasant fireside, 
abandon his cheerfulness, and restrain the fickle wan¬ 
derings of his affections, for aU the boasted superiority 
of the bilious temperament ? Or that the melanchohc 
man, in love with himself and his mournful humor, de¬ 
sires a change in his constitution ? Or that the phleg¬ 
matic indolence, which cares not whether the world 
was made for Caesar or no, would wish to part with its 
indifference, and figure in the career of public honors ? 
Providence has been merciful and benevolent to each. 
The best temperament, the beau ideal, is compounded 
of all the rest, and we wiU call it the tempered temper¬ 
ament; in which the happiest proportion of the ele¬ 
ments is observed, so that nature may be proud of her 
production. This model may never have existed in per¬ 
fection : many of the wise and good, who have been 
the benefactors of mankind, have approached near 
to it; our own Washington nearest of aU. 

We have now explained the six classes, into which 
all physical peculiarities and the corresponding moral 
ones may be resolved. It no longer remains difficult to 
show how men vary from one another in the manner in 
which we have stated. That a peculiar temperament 
distinguishes a nation, no one who wiU consult history, 
or look through the world, at the Turks, the Dutch, 
the Spaniards, can deny. It is equally obvious that 
the same defects and advantages of original organi- 


42 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


zation are transmitted in families. The distinction 
between individuals is as apparent as between the 
races. 

It is only in the comparison between man in one 
age and another, that physiologists, following the indi¬ 
cations of Plato in his impracticable theory of a repub¬ 
lic, beheve it possible to effect great changes and im¬ 
provements in his condition. When these ingenious 
observers are admitted to offer counsel, the most bril- 
hant prospects are opened for the amehoration of the 
human race, and the happiness, health, and virtue of 
future generations. The companions of man’s exist¬ 
ence, his dogs and his horses, have already seen the 
epoch of regeneration; it does but remain for him now 
to try upon himself, what he has so successfully at¬ 
tempted upon others; to review, says the illustrious 
Cabanis, who, for the most part, uses words consider¬ 
ately, ‘‘to review and correct the work of nature.” “ A 
daring enterprise ” he may well add. In that happy 
condition, which the physiologists are to prepare, the 
inequalities of temperaments are to be removed, and a 
mixture of the elements in the happiest proportions is 
to form a healthful body, the dwelling and the instru¬ 
ment of a healthful mind. There wdl then be no more 
of atrabilious frenzy; no more of athletic dulness; the 
phlegmatic are to exchange their inertness for the live¬ 
lier exercise of their bodies and the cheering efforts of 
imagination; and the sanguineous to be metamor- 


THE DOCTRINE OF TEMPERAMENTS. 


43 


phosed from frivolity to fixedness, from inattention 
and indecision to steadfastness of purpose. There is 
still ,to be an infinite variety of character, resulting 
chiefly from the influence of climate, age, regimen, and 
pursuits; but there is to be no more excess. Good¬ 
ness is to be ingrafted on every member of the human 
race. There is to be no more sorrowing for ideal 
suffering; the compressed lungs of the melancholy are 
to find rehef and freedom; their sombre features to 
kindle with habitual cheerfulness. And then this 
blessed age of our late posterity, is to wonder at 
the present; and to read wdth astonishment, that the 
science of physiology and the kindred studies have had 
no more influence in a century which boasts, and in 
many respects may justly boast, of its enlightened 
condition. 

With the best wishes for this improved race of 
man, which future times may behold, we turn to the 
world around us, where the thousand inadvertencies, 
follies, and excesses of men, continue to make them 
heirs to a thousand evils. Enough we believe, has 
been said to show, that the care and culture of' the 
physical system should be methodically pursued, in 
order to promote the health, just action, and harmo¬ 
nious co-operation of the body and the mind. 


ENNUI. 


I. 

Ennui is a word whicli the Erench invented, 
though of aU nations in Europe they know the least 
of it; while the Turks, with their untiring gravity, 
lethargic dignity, bhnd fatalism, opium-eating, and 
midnight profligacies, have imdoubtedly the largest 
share. Next to the Turks, the Enghsh suffer most 
from it. Hear the account which their finest poetical 
genius of the present century gives of himself, when he 
was hardly of age ; 

“ With pleasure drugged he almost longed for woe. 
And e’en for change of scene would seek the shades 
below.” 

The complaints of a young man in the bloom 
'of life and the vigor of early hope, cannot excite much 
sympathy. But in his fullest maturity he still draws 
the appalling picture of unalleviated ennui, in language 
that was the mournful echo of his mind. 

“ ’Tis tune this heart should be unmoved, 

Since others it has ceased to move; 

Yet, though I canot be beloved, 

Stni let me love.” 



ENNUI. 


45 


“ My days are in the yellow leaf; 

The flowers and fruits of love are gone; 

The worm, the canker, and the grief 
Are mine alone.” 

Such was the harassed state of Lord Byron, at the 
epoch which seemed to promise him a crowded suc¬ 
cession of exciting sensations. He was struggling 
for honor on the parent soil of glory; he was sur¬ 
rounded by the stir and tumult of barbarous warfare; 
he had the consciousness, that the eyes of the civihzed 
world were fixed upon his actions; he professed enthu¬ 
siasm in behalf of hberty; and yet there was not irri¬ 
tation enough in the new and busy life of the camp, to 
overcome his apathy. He only sought to give away 
his breath on the field, and take his rest in a soldier’s 
grave. 

The literature of the hour is essentially transient. 
The pubhc mind seizes rapidly every discovery; and 
rightly claims the instant distribution of truth. But 
with this is connected a feverish excitement for novelty. 
The world, in the earliest period of which accounts have 
reached us, followed after the newest strains; and now 
the voice of the past, aU musical as it is with the finest 
harmonies of human intelligencer, is lost in the jangling 
din of temporary discussions. Philosophy steals from 
the crowd, and hides herself in retirement, awaiting a 
better day; erudition is undervalued, and almost dis¬ 
appears. It would seem, as though the wise men of 


46 


ENNXJI. 


old frowned in anger on the turbulence of the petty 
passions, and withdrew from the contentious haunts, 
where wisdom has no votaries, and tranquillity no 
followers. In the days of ancient liberty, the public 
places rung with the nervous eloquence of sublime 
philosophy; and the streets of Athens offered nothing 
more attractive than the keen discussions, the piercing 
satire, and the calm philanthropy of Socrates. But 
now it is ephemeral politics which rule the city and 
the country; the times of deep reflection, of slowly 
maturing thought, are gone by; the age of studious 
learning is past, and every thing is carried along the 
rushing current of public economy, or of private 
business. Life is divided between excited passions 
and morbid indifference. 

And is this current so strong, that it cannot be 
resisted ? Can we never separate ourselves from the 
throng, and with dispassionate coolness, watch the 
various emotions and motives, by which society is 
swayed ? 

The moralists, who utter their oracles in the com¬ 
monplace complaints of a heathenish discontent, teU us, 
that we are born but to pursue, and pursue but to be de¬ 
ceived. They say that man in his eagerness for earthly 
honors, is like the child that chases the gaudy insect; 
the pursuit idle; the object worthless. They teU us, 
that it is but an illusive star, which beams from the 
summit of the distant hill; advance, and its light re- 


, ENNUI. 


47 


cedes; ascend, and a wider space is yet to be traversed, 
and a higher hill is seen beyond. And they tell ns, 
that this is vanity. But how poorly have they studied 
the secrets of the human breast! How imperfectly do 
they understand the feebleness and the strength of 
man’s fortitude ! If glory stiU rests on the remotest hill, 
if the distant sky is still invested with the delicate hues 
of promise, pursuit remains a pleasure; and the pilgrim, 
ever hght-hearted, passes heedlessly over each rugged 
barrier. But suppose the alluring star to be blotted 
out; the lustre of the horizon to have faded into the 
shades of a cloudy evening; the pursuit to be now 
without an object; and the blood which hope had sent 
merrily through the veins, to curdle round the despond¬ 
ing heart. Then it is, that the springs of joy are poi¬ 
soned by the demons of hstlessness. 

The scholar and the Christian have guarantees 
against despair. The desire for intelligence is never 
satisfied but with the attainment of that wisdom which 
passes all understanding; and the mind discerning the 
bright lineaments of its perfect exemplar, can set no 
limits to the sacred passion, which recognises the con¬ 
nection of the human with the divine, and places 
before itself a boundless career of advancement. But 
it is not wdth these high questions that we are at pres¬ 
ent engaged. We have thrown open the book of 
human life; we are to read there of this world and 
its littleness, of the springs of present action, of the 
relief of present restlessness. 


48 


ENNUI. 


We have said, that the pursuit of a noble object is 
in itself a pleasure. It is to the mind which shuns the 
forming a definite design, that the universe seems de¬ 
ficient in the means of happiness, and existence becomes 
a prey to the fiend of ennui. 

Let us analyze this sensation more accurately. Let 
us fix with exactness the true signification of ennui. 
Let us see if it be widely diffused. Let us ascertain 
the limits of its influence. Perhaps the investigation 
may lead us to a more intimate acquaintance with our 
nature. 


II. 

Ennui is the desire of activity without the fit means 
of gratifying the desire. It presupposes an acknowl¬ 
edgment of exertion as a duty, and a consciousness of 
the possession of powers suited to making an exertion. 
It is itself a state of idleness, yet of disquiet; a discon¬ 
tented inertness; an indeterminate craving and cease¬ 
less mobility, without any commensurate purpose. 
Wherever a course of conduct is the result of cheerful 
efforts to gain a livehhood, of a passion for intelligence, 
a zeal for glory, or to sum up a great variety of theories 
in one, of a just and enlightened self-love, there no ves¬ 
tige of ennui can be found. But should the primary 
motives of human effort fail, should the mind become 
a prey to listlessness and gnaw upon itself, all its de¬ 
vices to escape from this self-destructive process, are to 


ENNUI. 


49 


be ascribed to the presence of ennui. The most ener¬ 
getic of our race, in the very crisis of their career, if per¬ 
chance they are compelled to hesitate in the choice of 
their measures, and must wait fresh tidings before 
rushing to the field of action, may suffer from its tor¬ 
ments during the hours of expectation, which ahke 
refuse to be filled up or to pass away. Industry itself 
may tire of its task; and its longings for relief and 
change may bring with it disgust at its routine and a 
sense of weariness that can yet find no rest. Even the 
most indefatigable zealot, on attaining the result of his 
long, and hearty, and weU directed efforts, may at the 
very moment of perfect success give way to the senti¬ 
ment of satiety or of lassitude, and suffer the pain of 
discovering that aU is vanity and vexation of spirit, 
and that there is no profit under the sun. 

It is ennui that stupefies the dull preacher, who 
yawns over his weekly office and reads a lifeless sermon 
of which “ the saw ” puts the sinner to sleep. Often in 
the endless repetitions of the lawyer you may plainly 
see how he loathes 

‘‘To drudge for the dregs of men. 

And scrawl strange words with the barbarous pen/" 
The life of Napoleon, in the very moment of 
most imminent danger, presents a marvellous instance 
of ennui. While the aUies were collecting around hun 
m their utmost strength, he was himself wavering in 
his purposes, and reluctant to decide on the retreat to 
4 


50 


ENNUI. 


Leipsic. An eye-witness relates, “ I have seen him at 
that time seated on a sofa, beside a table on which lay 
his charts, totally unemployed, unless in scribbling me¬ 
chanically large letters on a sheet of white paper.” So 
heavily and slowly dragged the hours of suspense for 
the mighty warrior, at a time, when, in his own lan¬ 
guage, nothing but a thunderbolt could have saved him. 

Or, to take an example from the earliest monument 
of Grecian genius. Achilles, in the pride of youth, 
engaged in his favorite profession of arms, making his 
way to an immortality secured to him by the voice of 
his goddess mother, sure to gain the victory in any 
contest, and selecting for his reward the richest spoils 
and the fairest maid, Achilles, the heroic heathen, was 
fully and satisfactorily employed, and according to his 
semi-barbarous notions of joy and right, was happy 
Avithin his own breast, and was happy in the world 
around him. When the same youthful warrior was in¬ 
sulted by the leader under whose banners he had 
rallied, when the recesses of his tent were invaded and 
his domestic peace disturbed, his mind was strongly 
agitated by love, anger, hatred, the passion for strife, 
and the intense effort at forbearance; and though there 
was here room enough for activity, there was nothing 
but pain and misery. But when the dispute was over, 
and the pupil of the Centaur, trained for strife, and vic¬ 
tory, and glory, withdrew from the army, and gave 
himself up to an inactive contemplation of the struggle 


ENNUI. 


51 


against Troy, his energies were absorbed in the morbid 
feeling of ennui. Homer was the truest painter of the 
human passions. The picture which he draws of 
Achilles, receiving the subsequent deputation from the 
Greeks, illustrates our subject exactly. It was in vain 
for the hero to attempt to soothe his mind with the 
melodies of the lyre; his blood kindled only at the 
music of war: it was idle for him to seek pleasure in 
celebrating the renown of heroes; tjiis was but a vain 
effort to quell the biuming desire to surpass them in 
glory. He listens to the deputation, not tranquilly, 
but peevishly. He charges them with duplicity, and 
avows that he loathes their king like the gates of hell. 
He next reverts to himself: “The warrior has no 
thanks,” he exclaims in the bitterness of disappoint¬ 
ment ; “ the coward and the brave man are held in 
equal honor.” Nay, he goes further, and quarrels with 
providence and fixed destiny. “After all,” says he, 
“ the idler, and the man of many achievements, each 
must die.” “To-morrow,” he adds, “my vessels shall 
float on the Hellespont.” The morning dawned; but 
the ships of Achilles still Angered near the banks of the 
Scamander. The notes of the battle sounded, and he 
was still in suspense between the fiery impulse for war 
and the haughty reserve of revenge. 

When Bruce approached the sources of the Nile, a 
thousand sentiments of pride rushed upon his mind; 
he seemed to himself more fortunate and more glorious 


52 


ENNUI. 


than any European king or warrior, conqueror or 
traveller, that had ever attempted to penetrate into the 
interior of Africa. This was a moment of exultation 
and triumphant delight. But when he had actually 
reached the ultimate object of his research, he has him¬ 
self recorded the emotions which were awakened 
within him. At the fountain-head of the Nile, Bruce 
was almost a victim to sentimental ennui. 

In this anecdote of the Abyssinian traveller, we 
have an example of the rapidity with which disgust 
treads on the heels of triumph. We will cite another, 
where misery was followed and consmnmated by ennui. 
The most eloquent of the Girondists was Vergniaud. 
It was he that in the spirit of prophecy compared the 
Erench revolution to Saturn, since it was about to 
devour successively all its children, and finally to estab¬ 
lish despotism with its attendant calamities. The 
rivalship of the Mountain in the Convention, the unsuc¬ 
cessful attack on Robespierre, the trial and condemna¬ 
tion of Louis XVI., the defection of Dumourier and its 
consequences, had roused the mind of the fervent but 
foredoomed orator to the strongest efforts which the 
consciousness of wavering fortunes and the menace of 
utter ruin, patriotism, honor, and love of life, could call 
forth. At last came the day, fraught with horrors, 
when the clamors of a despotic and inexorable mob, 
claimed of the Convention Vergniaud and his associates, 
the little remnant of republican sincerity, to be the vie- 


ENNUI. 


53 


tims of their fiendish avidity for blood. Who will 
doubt, that during that fearful session the highest pos¬ 
sible excitement called him into the highest possible 
activity! Here there was no room for hstlessness, and 
quite as little for happiness. The guarantees of order 
were failing, and friends were to be buried under the 
same ruins with the remains of regular legislative au¬ 
thority. Vergniaud retired from the scenes where the 
foulest of the dogs of war were howling for their prey, 
and when Gregoire found him out in his hiding-place, 
the republican orator, though robbery and massacre 
were triumphant in the city, was discovered reading 
Tacitus. Wliy ? From afiectation ? Surely not; Gre- 
goire’s visit was unexpected. Prom cool philosophy ? 
Still less. The studies of Vergniaud on that day were 
the studies of a man burning for action, and having 
nothing before him but the heavy weariness of idle 
hours that seemed to lag forever. 

Ennui was the necromancer which conjured up the 
ghost of Caesar on the eve of the battle of Phillippi. 
And when Brutus prematurely esteemed the day lost, 
he had yet to wrestle with that unseen enemy, and 
enter on a new contest, where he was sure to be over¬ 
thrown. ‘‘ Oh liberty ! WTiat crimes are committed in 
thy name,’’ cried Madame Roland as she passed to the 
scafibld through intense and unmitigated suffering, 
dignifying the scene by the majesty of her own forti¬ 
tude. The Roman had no such nobleness of nature; 


54 


ENNUI. 


'' Oh virtue ! thou art but a name/’ he exclaimed, as he 
resolved on suicide. When Brutus dared to despair 
of virtue, the atrocious sentiment was dictated, not by 
the spirit that had aspired to restore the liberties of the 
world, but by the demon of ennui, which in an evil 
hour had possessed itself of the pretended patriot’s 
soul. 

Binally, to take but one more example, the timid 
lover, whose affections are moved, yet not tranquillized, 
who gazes with the eyes of fondness on an object that 
seems to be of a higher world, and admires as the stars 
are admired, which are acknowledged to be beautiful 
yet are never possessed; the timid lover neither wholly 
doubting, nor wholly hoping; the sport alternately 
of joy and of sorrow ; full of thought and full of 
longing; feeling the sentiment of rapture yield to the 
faintness of uncertain hope, is half his time a true per¬ 
sonification of ennui. 


III. 

That the activity of ennui is widely diffused, will 
hardly be denied by any careful observer of human 
nature. No individual can conscientiously claim to 
have been always and wholly free from its temptations, 
except where there has been a life springing from the 
purest sources, sanctified by the early influence of 
religious motives, and protected frrm erroneous judg- 


ENNUI. 


55 


ments by the steady exercise of a healthful under¬ 
standing. For the rest, though few are constantly 
afflicted with it as an incurable evil, there are still 
fewer who are not at times made to suffer from its 
assaults. It lays its heavy hand alike on the man of 
business and the recluse; it has its favorite haunts in 
the city, but it chases the aspirant after rural felicity, 
into the scenes of his rural hstlessness; it makes the 
young melancholy, and the aged garrulous; it haunts 
the sailor and the merchant; it appears to the warrior 
and to the statesman; it takes its place in the curule 
chair, and sits also at the frugal board of old-fashioned 
simplicity. You cannot flee from it; you cannot hide 
from it; it is swifter than the birds of passage, and 
swifter than the breezes that scatter clouds. It climbs 
the ship of the restless who long for the suns of Eu¬ 
rope ; it jumps up behind the horseman who scours 
the woods of Michigan; it throws its scowling glances 
on the attempt at present enjoyment; it scares the epi- 
curian from his voluptuousness, and when the ascetic 
has finished his vow, it compels him to repeat the tale 
of his beads. 

To the prevalence of ennui must be traced the 
craving for intense excitement. When life has become 
almost stagnant, and the ordinary course of events 
proves unable to awaken any strong interest, ennui 
assumes a terrific power, and clamors for emotion, 
though that emotion is to be purchased by scenes of 


56 


ENNUI. 


horror and of crime. ‘‘ What a magnificent entertain¬ 
ment! ” said the Parisian mob, “how interesting a 
spectacle to see a woman of the wit and courage of 
Madame Poland pass under the guillotine! ’’ And the 
sensitive admirer of works of fiction ransacks the 
shelves of a library for novels of thrilling and “ pain¬ 
ful interest. 

To the same kind of restless vacancy we have to 
ascribe the demand for the vehement declamations of 
the tragic actor, and the splendid music of the opera; 
the cunning tricks of the village conjuror, and the 
lascivious pantomime of the city ballet-dancers; the 
disgusting varieties of bull-fights, and the murderous 
feats of pugilism. It has sometimes driven men to 
indulge the locomotive zeal of the professed pedes¬ 
trians, and sometimes to seek the perfect quiescence of 
the “ piUar saints.’’ 

The habits of ancient Pome illustrate most clearly 
the extent to which the passion for strong sensations 
may hurry the public mind into extravagances, and 
repress every sentiment of sympathy and generosity. 
Ambition itself is not so reckless of human life as 
ennui; clemency is a favorite attribute of the former; 
but ennui has the tastes of a cannibal, and the sight 
of human blood, shed for its amusement, makes it 
greedy after a renewal of the dreadful indulgence. 
The shows of the ancient gladiators were attended 
by an infinitely more numerous throng than is ever 


ENNUI. 


57 


gathered by any modern spectacle. The fondness for 
murderous exhibitions raged with such vehemence, 
that they were at length introduced as an attraction 
at the banquet, and the guests, as they rechned at 
table in the luxury of physical ease, have been wet by 
the life-blood of the wounded gladiators. 

Quinetiam exhilarare viris convivia caede 
Mos olim, et miscere epulis spectacula dira 
Certantum ferro, saepe et super ipsa cadentum 
Pocula, respersis non parco sanguine mensis. 

Time would fail us were we to illustrate the various 
atrocities which attended these diversions, designed to 
amuse the most refined population of Rome; or even 
to enumerate the various classifications in the art of 
murder on the stage. And let it not be supposed, that 
the life of one of these combatants was the more safe, 
because it depended on the interposition of the Roman 
fair. The signals in token of relenting clemency, pro¬ 
ceeded commonly from the multitude; the more usual 
signal, made by virgins and matrons, demanded the 
continuance of the combat unto death. We call Titus 
the delight of the human race, and praise his common¬ 
place puerihty, perdidi diem, though it was the ex¬ 
clamation of conceit, rather than of manhness. It 
was this philanthropist, this favorite of humanity, 
who caused the vast Roman amphitheatre to be erect¬ 
ed, as it were a monument to all ages of the barbarous 
civihzation of the capital of his empire. And as to the 


58 


ENNUI. 


numbers who appeared on these occasions, was it a 
pair? or a score? We will not ask after the mas¬ 
sacres commanded and consummated by a Tiberius 
or a Caligula. Trajan was a discreet prince; dis¬ 
posed to introduce habits of industry. Yet he kept 
up a succession of games to cheat the population of 
Rome of ennui, during a hundred and twenty-three 
days, in which time ten thousand gladiators were 
decked for sacrifice. 

Thus the intenseness of this passion is evident from 
the method of relief which it required. We may also 
remark, that superstition itself, interwoven as it is 
with all the fears and weaknesses of humanity, sub¬ 
jects the human mind to a bondage less severe and less 
permanent than that of the terrific craving after some¬ 
thing to dissipate the weariness of the heart. At 
Rome the sacrifices to the heathen deities were abol¬ 
ished before the games of the gladiators were sup¬ 
pressed ; it was less difficult to take from the priests 
their spoils, from the altars their victims, from the 
prejudices of the people their religious faith, than to 
rescue from ennui the miserable wretches whose lives 
were to be the sport of the idle. The laws already 
forbade offering the bull to Jove, when the poet still 
had to pray that none might perish in the city under 
the condemnation of pleasure, 

Nullus in urbe cadat, cujus sit poena voluptas. 


ENNUI. 


59 


Philosophy itself offers no guarantee against the 
common infirmities of listlessness. Many a stoic has 
resisted the attacks of external evil with an exemplary 
fortitude, and has yet failed in his encounter with 
time. Strange, indeed, that time should be an incum¬ 
brance to a sage ! Strange indeed, that, when life is so 
short, and the range of thought boundless, and time 
the most precious of gifts, dealt out to us in successive 
moments, a possession which is most coveted, and can 
the least be hoarded, which comes, but never returns, 
which departs as soon as given, and is lost even in 
the receiving,—strange, indeed, that such a grant, so 
acceptable, so fleeting, and so irrevocable, should ever 
press severely upon a philosopher ! 

And yet wisdom is no security against ennui. 
The man who made Europe ring with his eloquence, 
and largely contributed to the spirit of republican 
enthusiasm, wasted away for months in a state of the 
most foolish torpidity, under the idea that he was 
dying of a polypus at his heart. Nay, this specu- 
latist, who presumed to believe himself skilled in the 
ways of man and an adept in those of women, who 
dared to expound religion and proposed to reform Chris¬ 
tianity, who committed and confessed the meanest 
actions, and yet, as if in the presence of the Supreme 
Arbiter of life and before the tribunal of Eternal 
Justice, arrogated to himself an equality with the 
purest in the innumerable crowd of the immortal— 


60 


ENNUI. 


he, the proud one, would so far yield to ennui, as 
to put the final and eternal welfare of his soul at 
issue on the throw of a stone. '' Je men vais^' he 
says to himself, ''je men vais jeter cette pierre centre 
Varhre qui est vis-a-vis de moi: si je le touche^ signe 
de solut; si je la manque, signe de damnation^ 

But Jean Jacques passes for a madman. The 
temperate Spinoza, being cut off from active life and 
from social love, necessarily encountered a void within 
himself. It was his favorite resource to catch spiders 
and teach them to fight; and when he had so far made 
himself master of the nature of these animals, that he 
could get them as angry as game cocks, he would, all 
thin and feeble as he was, break out into a roar of 
laughter, and chuckle to see his champions engage, as 
if they, too, were fighting for honor. 

Poor Spinoza! It may indeed be questioned, 
whether his whole philosophy was not a sort of pas¬ 
time with him. It may be, that he was ingenious 
because he could not be quiet, and wrote from a 
want of something to do. At any rate it has fared 
* strangely with his works. The world had well-nigh 
become persuaded, that Spinoza was but a name for 
the most desolating form of atheism, and next he 
is canonized. The skeptic Bayle heaps ridicule upon 
the great Jewish dialectician; the dreamer Novalis, 
who himself died of ennui, revered him as a model of 
sanctity. 


ENNUI. 


61 


But we have a stronger example than either of 
these. The very philosopher, who first declared ex¬ 
perience to be the basis of knowledge, and found 
his way to truth through the safe places of observation, 
gives in his own character some evidences of partici¬ 
pation in the common infirmity. He said very truly, 
that there is a foolish comer even in the brain of the 
sage. Yet if there has ever appeared on earth a man 
possessed of reason in its highest perfection, it was 
Aristotle. He had the gift of seeing the forms of 
things, undisturbed by the confusing splendor of 
their hues ; his faculties, like the art of sculpture, rep¬ 
resented objects with the most precise outhnes and 
exact images; but the world in his mind was a 
colorless world. He understood and has explained 
the secrets of the human heart; but he performs 
his moral dissections with the coolness of an anato¬ 
mist, engaged in a delicate operation. The nicety of 
his distinctions, and his deep insight into nature, are 
displayed without passion, while his constant effort 
after the discovery of new tmth, never for one moment 
betrays him into mysticism, or tempts him to substitute 
shadows for realities. One would think, that such a 
master of analysis was the personification of self-posses¬ 
sion ; that his unmffled mind would always dwell in the 
serene regions of intelligence; that his step would rest 
on the firm ground of experience; that his progress to 
the sublime temple of truth and of fame, would have 


62 


ENNUI. 


been ever secure and rapid; that happiness itself would 
have blessed him in his tranquil devotedness to exalted 
pursuits. 

In the mouth of Pindar, life might be called a 
dream, and it would but pass for the efPusion of poetic 
melancholy. But when the sagacious philosopher as¬ 
serts, that all hope is but the dream of waking man, the 
solemn expression of discontent is but the sad. confes¬ 
sion of his own unsatisfied curiosity; and nothing but 
the wonderful vigor of his mind could have preserved 
him from settled gloom. 

Again the venerable sage examined into the sources 
of happiness. It does not consist, he affirms, in volup¬ 
tuous pleasures, for they are transient, brutalizing, and 
injurious to the mind; nor in public honors, for they 
depend on those who bestow them, and it is not 
fehcity to be the recipient of an uncertain bounty; 
nor yet does happiness consist in riches, for the care 
of them is but a toil; and if they are expended, it is 
plainly a proof, that contentment is sought for in the 
possession of other things. In his view, happiness 
consists in the pursuit of knowledge, and in the prac-» 
tice of virtue, under the auspices of mind, and nature, 
and fortune. He that is intelligent, and young, and 
handsome, and vigorous, and rich, is alone the happy 
man. Did the world need the sublime wisdom, the 
high endowment of the Stagyrite, to teach, that nei¬ 
ther the poor, nor the dull, nor the aged, nor the sick. 


ENNUI. 


63 


can share in the highest blessings of mortal being? 
When it is remembered that Aristotle was favored 
above all his contemporaries in intellectual gifts, we 
invite the reader to draw an inference as to the state of 
his mind, which still demanded the beauties of per¬ 
sonal attractions, and the lavish liberality of fortune. 

Wlien asked what is the most transient of fleeting 
things, the philosopher made but a harsh answer, in 
naming ‘‘gratitude;” but his mind must have been 
sadly a prey to ennui, when he could exclaim, “ My 
friends ! there are no friends.” 

He was not willing to sit or stand still, when he 
gave lessons in moral science; but walked to and fro 
in constant restlessness. Indeed, if tradition reports 
rightly, he did not wait the will of Heaven for his 
release from weariness, but in spite of aU his subhme 
teachings and all his expansive genius, he was content 
to die as the fool dieth. 

But ennui kills others beside philosophers. It is 
not without example, that men have died by their own 
hand, because they have attained their utmost mshes. 
The man of business, flnding himself possessed of a 
sufficient fortune, retires from his wonted employments; 
but the habit of action remains, and becomes a power 
of terriflc force. In such cases, the sufferer whiles 
away listless hours of intense suffering; the mind 
preys upon itself, and sometimes life ebbs of itself, 
sometimes suicide is committed. 


64 


ENNUI. 


Saul went out to find liis father’s asses. Pleased 
with the humble employment he made search with a 
light heart and an honest one. But, seeking asses, he 
found a kingdom; and tranquillity fled when posses¬ 
sion was complete. The reproofs of conscience and 
discontent with the world produced in him a morbid 
melancholy, and pain itself would have been to him 
a welcome refuge from ennui. 

We detect the same subtle spirit at work in the 
slanders in which gossips find relief. Truth is not ex¬ 
citing enough to those who depend on the characters 
and lives of their neighbors for aU their amusement; 
and if a story is told of more than common interest, 
ennui is sure to have its joy in adding embellishments. 
If hours did not hang heavy, what would become of 
scandal? Time, the common enemy, must be passed, 
as the phrase is, and the phrase bears its own com¬ 
mentary ; and since the days of gladiators are gone by, 
what better substitute than blackening the reputation 
of the living? To the pusillanimous and the idle, 
scandal is the condiment of life; and while backbiting 
furnishes their entertainment abroad, domestic quarrel¬ 
ling fills up the leisure hours at home. It is a pretty 
general rule, that the medisante is a termagant in her 
household; and, as for our own sex, in nine cases out 
of ten, the evil tongue belongs to a disappointed man. 

Pashion, also, in its excess, is but a relief against 
ennui; and it is strong evidence of the universal preva- 


ENNUI. 


65 


lence of listlessness, that a change in dress at Paris 
can, within a few months, be imitated in St. Louis. 
But not ennui, a milder influence sways the conduct 
of the young and the fair. The latent consciousness of 
beauty, the charm of an existence that is opening in 
the fulness of its attractions, the becoming loveliness 
of innocence and youth, the simple cheerfulness of in¬ 
experience, lead them to find delight in a modest and 
graceful display. The unrivalled Broadway is not 
without its loungers; yet of these the young and the 
gay are not discontented ones. In the strength of 
their own charms, they, like the patriot statesman, 
neither shun nor yet court admiration; and as they 
move along the brilliant street, half coveting half re¬ 
fusing attention, 

“ They feel that they are happier than they know.” 

Prom Broadway we pass to the crowded haunts of 
business. Is ennui found there ? Do the money¬ 
changers grow weary of profits ? Is business so dull 
that bankers are without employment? Have the 
underwriters nothing at sea to be anxious about ? Do 
the insurers on life forget to exhort the holders of its 
policies to temperance and exercise? These are all 
too profoundly engaged and too little romantic, to 
be moved by sentimental repinings. But there are 
those, who plunge headlong into affairs from the rest¬ 
lessness of their nature, and who hurry into bold enter- 
5 


66 


ENNUI. 


prises, because they cannot endure to be idle. Business, 
like poetry, requires a tranquil mind; but there are 
those, who venture upon its tide, under the impulse of 
ennui. How shall the young and haughty heirs of 
large fortunes rid themselves of their time, and acquit 
themselves in the eye of the pubhc of their imagined 
responsibilities ? One writes a tale for the Souvenirs, 
another speculates in stocks. The former is laughed 
at, yet hoards an estate; the latter is food for hungry 
sharks. Then comes bankruptcy; and sober thought 
repels the fiend that had been making a waste of life; 
or the same passion drives its possessor to become a 
busy-body and zealot in the current excitement of the 
times ; or absolute despair, ennui in its intensity, leads 
to insanity. 

Bor the mad-house, too, as well as the debtor’s 
jail, is recruited by the same blighting power, and 
nature recovers from languid apathy by the excitement 
of frenzy. Or the thought of suicide creeps in ; fancy 
revels in the contemplation of the grave, and covets 
the aspect of death as the face of a famihar friend. 
The mind invests itself in the sombre shades of a mel¬ 
ancholy longing after eternal rest—a longing which is 
sometimes connected with unqualified disbehef, and 
sometimes associated with an undefined desire of a 
purely spiritual existence. 


ENNUI. 


67 


IV. 

We might multiply examples of the very extensive 
prevalence of that unhappy languor of which we are 
treating. Let us aim rather at observing the limi t of 
its power. 

It was a mistaken philosophy, which believed in 
ennui as an evidence and a means of human perfec¬ 
tibility. The only exertions which it is capable of pro¬ 
ducing, are of a subordinate character. It may give 
to passion a fearful intensity, consequent on a state of 
moral disease; but human virtue must be the result of 
far higher causes. The exercise of principle, the gene¬ 
rous force of purified emotions, cheerful desire, and 
willing industry, are the parents of real greatness. If 
we look through the various departments of pubhc and 
of intellectual action, we shall find the mark of inferior¬ 
ity upon every thing which has sprung fi'om ennui. In 
the mechanic arts it may contrive a balloon, but never 
could invent a steamboat. In philosophy it might 
beget the foUies of Cynic oddity, but not the subhme 
lessons of Pythagoras. In religion, it stumbles at a 
thousand knotty points in metaphysical theology, but 
it never led the soul to intercourse with Heaven, or to 
the contemplation of divine truth. 

The celebrated son of Philip, “ Macedonia’s mad¬ 
man,” was of exalted genius; and political wisdom had 
its share in his career. Ennui could never have pro- 


68 


ENNUI. 


duced him; but it may well put in its claim to the 
Swede. Or let us look rather for a conqueror, who 
dreamed that he had genius to rival Achilles, and yet 
never formed a settled plan of action. The famous 
king of Epirus has seemed to be an historical puzzle, 
so uncertain was his purpose, so wavering his character. 
WiU you know the whole truth about him ? Pyrrhus 
was an ennuyL 

In verse, ennui may produce effusions from “ per¬ 
sons of quality,” devoid of wit and sense; but not the 
satire of Pope. When a poet writes a song for hire, 
or solely to be sung to some favorite air, it is more than 
probable his verses mU be lifeless, and his meaning 
doubtful. Thus, for example,— 

‘‘ The smiles of joy, the tears of woe. 

Deceitful shine, deceitful flow.” 

This is sheer nonsense, the evidence of a vacant mind. 
Joy smiles in good earnest, and many an aching heart 
knows too well the deep truth of distress. 

It is dangerous for a man of superior ability to find 
' himself thrown upon the world without some regular 
employment. The restlessness inherent in genius being 
thus left undirected by any permanent infiuence, frames 
for itself occupations out of accidents. Even moral in¬ 
tegrity sometimes falls a prey to this want of fixed 
pursuits. Genius, so left without guidance, attains no 
noble ends; but resembles rather a copious spring, con- 


ENNUI. ' 


69 


veyed in a decaying aqueduct; where the waters contin¬ 
ually waste away through the frequent crevices. The law 
of nature is here, as elseAvhere, binding; and no pow- 
erfid results ever ensue from the trivial exercise of high 
endowments. The finest mind, when destitute of a 
fixed purpose, passes away without leaving permanent 
traces of its existence. 

These remarks apply perhaps in some measure 
even to Leibnitz, whose intelligence and mental ac¬ 
tivity were the wonder of his age. He attained 
celebrity, but hardly a contented spirit; at times he 
descended to the consideration of magnitudes infinitely 
small, and at times rose to the belief that he heard the 
universal harmony of nature; for years he was devoted 
to illustrating the antiquities of the family of a petty 
prince; and then again he assumed the sublime office 
of defending the perfections of Providence. Yet with 
this variety of pursuit, the great philosopher was hardly 
to be called a happy man; and it is enough to fiU us 
with melancholy to find, that the very theologian who 
would have proved this to be absolutely the best of 
all possible worlds, died of chagrin. Our subject 
is more fully illustrated in the case of a less gifted, 
though a notorious man, the famed Lord Bolingbroke. 
His talents as a writer have secured him a distinguished 
place in the literature of England; and his political ser¬ 
vices, during the reign of Queen Anne, have rendered 
him illustrious in English history. But though he was 


70 


ENNUI. 


possessed of wit, eloquence, family, wealth, and oppor¬ 
tunity, he never displayed true dignity of character, or 
real greatness of soul. He appeared to have no fixed 
principles of action; and to have loved contest more 
than victory. Wherever there was strife, there you 
might surely expect to meet St. John; and his pubhc 
career almost justifies the inference, that after a defeat 
apostasy seemed to him a moderate price for permis¬ 
sion to appear again in the fists. But as he always 
coveted power with an insatiable avidity, he never could 
rest long enough to acquire it. On the stormy sea of 
public fife, he was for ever struggling to be on the top¬ 
most wave; but the waves receded as fast as he ad¬ 
vanced; and fate seemed to have destined him to 
fruitless efforts and as fruitless changes. 

In early fife he sought distinction by his debauch¬ 
eries ; and succeeded in becoming the most daring 
profligate in London. Tired of the excess of dissipa¬ 
tion, he attempted the career of politics, and found his 
way into Parliament under the auspices of the whigs. 
When politics failed, he put on the mask of a metaphy¬ 
sician. Weary of that costume, he next attempted to 
play the farmer. Dissatisfied with farming, he wrote 
political pamphlets. StiU discontented, he strove, to 
undermine the basis of the religious faith of his 
country. 

He began public fife as a whig; but as the tories 
were in the ascendant, he rapidly ripened into a tory; 


ENNUI. 


71 


he ended his poUtical career by deserting the tories, 
and avowing the doctrines of stanch and uncom¬ 
promising whigs. He tried hbertinism, married hfe, 
pohtics, power, exile, restoration, the House of Com¬ 
mons, the House of Lords, the city, the country, 
foreign travel, study, authorship, metaphysics, infi¬ 
delity, farming, treason, submission, derehction,—^but 
ennui held him with a firm grasp all the while, and it 
was only in the grave that he ceased from troubling. 

To an observer who peruses his writings with this 
view of his character, many of his expressions of wise 
indifierence and calm resignation, have even a ludicrous 
aspect. The truth breaks forth from all his attempts 
at disguise. The philosopher’s robes could not hide 
the stately wrecks of his political passions. Hound the 
base of Vesuvius, the lava of former eruptions has so 
entirely resolved itself into soil, that vineyards thrive 
on the black ruins of the volcano; and the ancient de¬ 
vastation could hardly be recognised, except for an 
occasional dark mass, which, not yet decomposed, 
fro^vns here and there over the surrounding fertility. 
Something like this was true of St. John ; he believed 
his ambition extinct, and attempted to gather round 
its ruins aU the beauties and splendor of contented 
wisdom; but his nature was stiU ungovernably fierce; 
and to the last, his passions lowered angrily on the 
quiet scenes of his hterary retirement. 

There is no clue to his career, except in supposing 


72 


ENNUI. 


him to have been under the influence of ennui, which 
was perpetually terrifying him into the grossest contra¬ 
dictions. He could not be said to have had any prin¬ 
ciples, or to have belonged to any party; and wherever 
he gave in his adhesion, he was sure to become utterly 
faithless. He was not less false to the Pretender than 
to the King, to Ormond than to Walpole. He was 
false to the tories and false to the whigs; he was false 
to his country, for he attempted to involve her in civil 
war; and false to his God, for he combated religion. 
He was not swayed by a passion for glory, for he did 
not pursue it steadily; nor by a passion for power, 
for he quarrelled with the only man by whose aid he 
could have maintained it. He was rather driven to 
and fro by a wild restlessness, which led him into gross 
contradictions “ for his sins. ” Nor was his falsehood 
without its punishment. What could be more pitifully 
degrading, than for one who had been a successful 
British minister of state, and had displayed in the face 
of Europe his capacity for business and his powers of 
eloquence, to accept a seat in the Pretender’s cabinet, 
where pimps and prostitutes were the prime agents 
and counsellors ? 

There exists a very pleasant letter from Pope, 
giving an account of Bolingbroke’s rm^al occupations, 
during his country life in England, after the reversal 
of his attainder. He insisted on being a farmer; and 
to prove himself so, hired a painter to fill the walls of 


ENNUI. 


73 


his countryhouse with rude pictures of the implements 
of husbandry. The poet describes him standing be¬ 
tween two haycocks, watching the clouds with all the 
apparent anxiety of a husbandman; but to us it seems 
that his mind was at that time no more in the skies, 
than when he quoted Anaxagoras, and declared heaven 
to be the wise man’s home. His heart clung to earth, 
and to earthly strife; and his uneasiness must at last 
have become deplorably wretched, since he could con¬ 
sent to leave a piece of patchwork, made up of the 
shreds of other men’s skepticism, as his especial legacy 
to posterity. 

Thus we have endeavored to explain the nature of 
that apathy which is worse than positive pain, and 
which impels to greater madness than the fiercest 
passions,—which kings and sages have not been able 
to resist, nor wealth nor pleasures to subdue. We 
have described ennui as a power for evil rather than 
for good; and we infer, that it was an erroneous 
theory which classed it among the causes of human 
superiority, and the means of human improvement. 
It is the curse pronounced upon voluptuous indolence 
and on excessive passion; on those who decUne active 
exertion, and thus throw away the privileges of exist¬ 
ence ; and on those who live a feverish life, in the con¬ 
stant frenzy of stimulated desires. There is but one 
cure for it, and that is found in moderation; the exer¬ 
cise of the human facidties in their natural and health- 


74 


ENNUI. 


ful state; the quiet performance of duty, in meek sub¬ 
mission to the controUing Providence, which has set 
bounds to our achievements in setting hmits to our 
powers. Briefly: our abihty is limited by Heaven— 
our desires are unlimited, except by ourselves—ennui 
can be avoided only by conforming the passions of the 
human breast to the conditions of human existence. 


I 



THE RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


I. 

“ Life/’ says Sir William Temple, ‘‘ is like wine; 
he, who would drink it pure, must not drain it to the 
dregs/’ ‘‘ I do not wish,” Byron would say, “ to live 
to become old.” The expression of the ancient poet, 

“ that to die young is a boon of heaven to its favor¬ 
ites,” was repeatedly quoted by him with approbation. 
The certainty of a speedy release he would call the only 
relief against burdens, which could not be borne, were 
they not of very hmited duration. 

But the general sentiment of mankind declares 
length of days to be desirable. After an active and 
successful career, the repose of decline is serene and 
cheerful. By common consent grey hairs are a crown f 
of glory; the only object of respect that can never f 
excite envy. The hour of evening is not necessarily • 
overcast; and the aged man, exchanging the pursuits [ 
of ambition for the quiet of observation, the strife of f 
pubhc discussion' for the diffuse but instructive Ian- f 


76 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


guage of experience, passes to the grave amidst grate¬ 
ful recollections and the tranquil enjoyment of satisfied 
desires. 

The happy, it is agreed by all, are afraid to con¬ 
template their end; the unhappy, it has been said, look 
forward to it as to a release from suffering. “ I think 
of death often,” said a distinguished but dissatisfied 
man; ‘‘ and I view it as a refuge. There is something 
calm and soothing to me in the thought; and the only 
time that I feel repugnance to it, is on a fine day, in 
solitude, in a beautiful country, when aU nature seems 
rejoicing in light and life.” 

This is the language of self-delusion. Numerous 
as may be the causes for disgust with life, its close is 
never contemplated with, carelessness. Religion may 
elevate the soul to a subhme rehance on a future exist¬ 
ence ; nothing else can do it. The love of honor may 
brave danger; the passion of melancholy may indulge 
an aversion to continued being; philosophy may take 
its last rest with composure; the sense of shame may 
conduct to fortitude; yet they who would disregard 
the grave, must turn their thoughts from the consider¬ 
ation of its terrors. It is an impulse of nature to strive 
to preserve our being; and the longing cannot be 
eradicated. The mind may shun the contemplation 
of horrors; it may fortify itself by refusing to observe 
the nearness or the extent of the impending evil; but 
the instinct of life is stubborn ; and he, who looks di- 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


77 


rectly at its termination and professes indifference, is a 
hypocrite, or is self-deceived. He that calls boldly 
upon death, is sure to be dismayed on finding him 
near. The oldest are never so old, but they desire life 
for one day longer; the child looks to its parent, as if 
to discern a glimpse of hope; even the infant, as it 
/ exhales its breath, springs from its pillow to meet its 
^ mother, as if there were help where there is love. 

There is a story told of one of the favorite marshals 
of Napoleon, who, in a battle in the south of Germany, 
was struck by a cannon ball, and so severely wounded, 
that there was no possibility of a respite. Summoning 
the surgeon, he ordered his wounds to be dressed; and, 
when aid was declared to be unavailing, the dying officer 
clamorously demanded that Napoleon should be sent 
for, as one who had power to stop the effusion of 
blood, and awe nature itself into submission. Life 
expired amidst maledictions and threats heaped upon 
the innocent surgeon. This foolish frenzy may have 
appeared like blasphemy; it was but the uncontrolled 
outbreak of the instinct of self-preservation, in a rough 
and undisciplined mind. 

Even in men of strong religious convictions, the 
end is not always met with serenity; and the preacher 
and philosopher sometimes express an apprehension, 
which cannot be pacified. The celebrated British 
moralist, Samuel Johnson, was the instructor of his 
age; his works are full of the austere lessons of 


78 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


reflecting wisdom. It might have been supposed, 
that rehgion would have reconciled him to the decree 
of Providence; that philosophy would have taught him 
to acquiesce in a necessary issue; that science would 
have inspired him with confldence in the skill of his 
medical attendants. And yet it was not so. A sullen 
gloom overclouded his faculties; he could not summon 
resolution to tranquilhse his emotions; and, in the 
absence of his attendants, he gashed himself''with 
ghastly and debilitating wounds, as if the bhnd lacer¬ 
ations of his misguided arm could prolong the mo¬ 
ments of an existence, which the best physicians of 
London declared to be numbered. 

“ Is there any thing on earth I can do for you? ” 
said Taylor to Wolcott, known as Peter Pindar, as he 
lay on his death-bed. “ Give me back my youth; ’’ 
were the last words of the satirical bufibon. 

If Johnson could hope for relief from self-inflicted 
wounds, if the poet could prefer to his friend the 
useless prayer for a restoration of youth, we may 
readily beheve what historians relate to us of the end 
of Louis XI. of Prance; a monarch, who was not des¬ 
titute of eminent qualities as well as repulsive vices; 
possessing courage, a knowledge of men and of busi¬ 
ness, an indomitable will, a disposition favorable to the 
administration of justice among his subjects; viewing 
impunity in wrong as exclusively a royal prerogative. 
Remorse, fear, a consciousness of being detested, dis- 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


79 


gust with life and horror of death,—these were the sen¬ 
timents which troubled the sick couch of the absolute 
king. The first of his line who bore the epithet of 
‘‘ the most Christian,” he was so abandoned to egotism, 
that he allowed the veins of children to be opened, 
and greedily drank their blood; beheving with physi¬ 
cians of that day, that it would renovate his youth, or 
at least check the decay of nature. The cruelty was 
useless. At last, feeling the approach of death to be 
certain, he sent for an anchorite from Calabria, since 
revered as St. Francis de Paule; and when the hermit 
arrived, the monarch of France entreated him to spare 
his life. He threw himself at the feet of the man who 
was believed to derive heahng virtues from the sanctity 
of his character; he begged the intercession of his 
prayers; he wept; he supphcated; he hoped that the 
voice of a Calabrian monk would reverse the order of 
nature, and successfully plead for his respite. 

We find the love of life still more strongly acknow¬ 
ledged by an Enghsh poet; who, after describing our 
being as the dream of a shadow, “ a weak-built isth¬ 
mus between two eternities, so frail, that it can sustain 
neither wind nor wave,” yet avows his preference of a 
few days’, nay, of a few hours’ longer residence upon 
earth, to all the fame which poetry can achieve. 

Fain would I see that prodigal, 

Wlio his to-morrow would bestow, 

For all old Homer’s life, e’er since he died, till now ! 


80 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


/• 


II. 


We do not believe the poet sincere; for one passion 
may prevail over another, and in many a breast the 
love of fame is at times, if not always, the strongest. 
But if those who pass their lives in a struggle for 
glory may desire the attainment of their object at any 
price, the competitors for political power are apt to 
cling fast to the scene of their rivalry. Lord Castle- 
reagh could indeed commit suicide; but it was not 
from disgust; his mind dwelt on the precarious condi¬ 
tion of his own elevation, and the unsuccessful policy in 
which he had involved his country. He did not love 
death; he did not contemplate it with indifference; he 
failed to observe its terrors, because his attention was 
absorbed by apprehensions which pressed themselves 
upon him with unrelenting force. 

The ship of the Marquis of Badajoz, viceroy of 
Peru, was set on fire by Captain Stayner. The 
marchioness, and her daughter, who was betrothed 
to the Duke of Medina-Celi, swooned in the flames, 
and could not be rescued. The marquis resigned 
himelf also to die, rather than survive with the memory 
of such horrors. It was not, that he was careless of 
life; the natural feelings remained unchanged; the 
love of grandeur; the pride of opulence and dominion; 
but he preferred death, because that was out of sight, 
and would rescue him from the presence of absorbing 
and intolerable sorrows. 



RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


81 


Madame de Sevigne, in her charming letters, 
gives the true sensations of the ambitious man, when 
suddenly called to leave the scenes of his efforts 
and his triumphs. Rumor, with its wonted credu- 
hty, ascribed to Louvois, the powerful minister of 
Louis XIV., the crime of suicide. His death was 
sudden, but not by his own arm; he fell a victim, 
if not to disease, to the revenge of a woman. In 
a night, the most energetic, reckless statesman in 
Europe, passionately fond of place, extending his in¬ 
fluence to every cabinet, and embracing in his views 
the destiny of continents, was called away. How 
much business was arrested in progress! how many 
projects defeated! how many secrets buried in the 
silence of the grave ! Who should disentangle the 
interests, which his pohcy had rendered comphcate? 
Who should terminate the wars which he had begun ? 
Who should follow up the blows which he had aimed ? 
Well might he have exclaimed to the angel of death, 
“ Ah, grant me a short reprieve; spare me, tfll I can 
check the Duke of Savoy; checkmate the Prince of 
Orange ! ’’—‘‘ No 1 No ! You shall not have a single, 
single minute.’’—^Death is as inexorable to the prayer 
of ambition, as to the entreaty of despair. The ruins 
of the Palatinate; the wrongs of the Huguenots were to 
be avenged; and Louvois, hke Louis XL and like the 
rest of mankind, was to learn, that the passion for life, 
whether expressed in the language of superstition, of 
6 


82 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


abject despondency, or of the desire of continued 
power, could not prolong existence for a moment. 

III. 

But though the love of hfe may be declared a uni¬ 
versal instinct, it does not follow that death is usually 
met with abjectness. It belongs to virtue and to man¬ 
liness to accept the inevitable decree with finnness. It 
is often sought voluntarily; but even then the latent pas¬ 
sion is discernible. A sense of shame, a desire of plun¬ 
der, a hope of emolument,—^these, not less than a sense 
of duty, are motives sufficient to influence men to defy 
all danger; yet the feeling for self-preservation does not 
cease to exert its power. The common hireling soldier 
contracts to expose himseK to the deadly fire of a 
hostile army, whenever his employers may command 
it; he does it, in a controversy of which he knows not 
the merits, for a party to which he is essentially indif¬ 
ferent, for purposes which, perhaps, if his mind were 
enlightened, he would labor to counteract. The life 
of the soldier is a life of contrast; of labor and idle¬ 
ness ; it is a course of routine, easy to be endured, and 
leading only at intervals to exposure. The love of ease, 
the certainty of obtaining the means of existence, the 
remoteness of peril, conspire to tempt adventurers, and 
the armies of Europe have never suffered from any 
other limit than the wants of the treasury. But the 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


83 


same soldier would fly precipitately from any hazard 
which he had not bargained to encounter. The mer¬ 
chant will visit the deadhest climates in pursuit of 
gain; he w’ill pass over regions, where the air is known 
to be corrupt, and disease to have anchored itself in 
the hot, heavy atmosphere. And this he will attempt 
repeatedly, and with firmness, in defiance of the crowds 
of corpses which he may see carried by wagon loads to 
the grave-yards. But the same merchant would be 
struck by panic and desert his own residence in a more 
favored chme, should it be invaded by epidemic disease. 
He who would fearlessly meet the worst forms of a 
storm at sea, and take his chance of escaping the fever 
as he passed through New Orleans, would shun New 
York in the season of the cholera, and shrink from any 
danger which was novel and unexpected. The widows 
of India ascend the funeral pile with a fortitude which 
man could never display; and emulously yield up 
their fives to a barbarous usage, which, if men had been 
called upon to endure it, would never have been perpet¬ 
uated. Yet is it to be supposed that these unhappy 
victims are indifierent to the charms of existence, or 
blind to the terrors of its extinction ? Calmly as they 
may lay themselves upon the pyre, they would beg for 
mercy, were their execution to be demanded in any 
other way; they would confess their fear, were it not 
that love and honor and custom confirm their doom. 

No class of men in the regular discharge of duty 


84 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


incur danger more frequently than the honest physi¬ 
cian. There is no type'of malignant maladies with 
which he fads to become acquainted; no hospital so 
crowded with contagion, that he dares not walk freely 
through its wards. His vocation is among the sick and 
the dying; he is the familiar friend of those who are 
sinking under infectious disease; and he never shrinks 
from the horror of observing it under all its aspects. 
He must do so with equanimity; as he inhales the 
poisoned atmosphere, he must coolly reflect on the 
medicines which may mitigate the sufferings that he 
cannot remedy. Nay; after death has ensued, he 
must search Avith the dissecting knife for its hidden 
cause, if so by multiplying his own perils he may dis¬ 
cover some alleviation for the afflictions of others. And 
why is this ? Because the physician is indifierent to 
death? Because he is steeled and hardened against 
the fear of it ? Because he despises or pretends to 
despise it ? By no means. It is his especial business 
to value life; to cherish the least spark of animated 
existence. And the habit of caring for the lives of his 
fellow-men, is far from leading him to an habitual in¬ 
difference to his own. The physician shuns every 
danger, but such as the glory of his profession com¬ 
mands him to defy. 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


85 


IV. 

Thus we are led to explain the anomaly of suicide, 
and reconcile the apparent contradiction of a terror 
of death, which is yet voluntarily encountered. It 
may seem a paradox; but the dread of dying has 
itself sometimes prompted suicide, and the man who 
seeks to destroy himself, at the very moment of perpe¬ 
trating his crime betrays the passion for life. Menace 
him with death under a different form from that which 
he has chosen, and like other men, he will get out of 
its way. He will defend himself against the assassin, 
though he might be ready to cut his own throat; he 
will, if at sea, and the ship were sinking in a storm, 
labor with his whole strength to save it from going 
down, even if he had formed the design to leap into the 
ocean in the first moment of a calm. Place him in the 
van of an army, it is by no means certain that he will 
not prove a coward; tell him the cholera is about to 
rage, and he will deluge himself with preventive reme¬ 
dies ; send him to a house visited with yellow fever, 
and he will steep himself in vinegar and carry with him 
an atmosphere of camphor. It is only under the one 
form, which the mind in some insane excitement may 
have chosen, that he preserves the desire to leave the 
world. 

It will not be difficult, then, to set a right value on 
the declaration of those who profess to regard death 


86 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


not with indifference merely, but contempt. It is pure 
affectation, or the indulgence of a vulgar levity; and 
must excite either compassion or disgust, according as it 
is marked by the spirit of fiendish scoffing or of human 
vanity and self-deception. A French moralist tells us 
of a valet, who danced merrily on the scaffold, where 
he was to be broken on the wheel. A New England 
woman, belonging to a family which esteemed itself 
one of the first, was convicted of aiding her paramoui 
to kill her husband. She was a complete sensualist, 
one to whom life was every thing, and the loss of it the 
total shipwreck of every thing. On her way to the 
place of execution she was accompanied by a clergyman 
of no very great ability; and all along the road, with 
the gallows in plain sight, she amused herself in teas¬ 
ing the good man, whose wits were no match for her 
raillery. He had been bu 3 dng a new chaise, quite an 
event in the life of an humble country pastor, and when 
he spoke of the next world, she would amuse herself in 
praising his purchase. If he deplored her fate and her 
prospects, she would grieve at his exposure to the in¬ 
clement weather; and laughed and chatted, as if she 
had been driving to a wedding, and not to her o'wn 
funeral. And why was this ? Because death was not 
feared ? No; but because death was feared, and 
feared intensely. The Eastern women, who are burned 
alive with their deceased husbands, often utter shrieks 
that would pierce the hearers to the soul; and to pre- 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


87 


vent a compassion whicli would endanger the reign of 
superstition, the priests with drums and cymbals, 
droAvn the terrific cries of their victims. So it is with 
those who go to the court of the King of Terrors with 
merriment on their lips. They dread his presence; 
and they seek to drown the noise of his approaching 
footsteps by the sound of their own ribaldry. If the 
scaffold often rings with a jest, it is because the mind 
shrinks from the solemnity of the impending change. 


V. 

Perhaps the most common device for averting con¬ 
templation from death itself, is in directing it to the 
manner of dying. Vanitas vanitatum! Vanity does 
not give up its hold on the last hour. Men wish to die 
with distinction, to be buried in state; and the last 
thoughts are employed on the decorum of the moment, 
or in the anticipation of funereal splendors. It was no 
uncommon thing among the Romans for a rich man to 
appoint an heir, on condition that his obsequies should 
be celebrated with costly pomp. ‘‘ When I am dead,” 
said an Indian chief, who fell into his last sleep at 
Washington,—“ when I am dead, let the big guns be 
fired over me. ” The words were thought worthy 
of being engraved on his tomb; but they are no 
more than a plain expression of a very common passion; 
the same, which leads the humblest to desire that at 


88 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


least a stone may be placed at the head of his grave, 
and demands the erection of splendid mausoleums and 
costly tombs for the mistaken men, 

Who by the proofs of death pretend to live. 

Among the ancients, an opulent man, while yet in 
health, would order his own sarcophagus; and nowa¬ 
days the wealthy sometimes build their own tombs, for 
the sake of securing a satisfactory monument. A vain 
man, who had done this at a great expense, showed 
his motive so plainly, that his neighbors laughed with 
the sexton of the parish, who wished that the builder 
might not be kept long out of the interest of his 
money. 

But it is not merely in the decorations of the grave 
that vanity is displayed. Saladin, in his last illness, 
instead of his usual standard, ordered his shroud to be 
uplifted in front of his tent; and the herald, who hung 
out this winding-sheet as a flag, was commanded to 
exclaim aloud: ‘‘ Behold! this is all which Saladin, the 
vanquisher of the East, carries away of all his con¬ 
quests.’’ He was wrong there. He came naked into 
the world, and he left it naked. Grave-clothes were a 
superfluous luxury, and to the person receiving them, 
as barren of comfort as his sceptre or his scymitar. 
Saladin was vain. He sought in dying to contrast the 
power he had enjoyed with the feebleness of his con¬ 
dition; to pass from the world in a striking an- 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


89 


tithesis; to make his death scene an epigram. All 
was vanity. 

A century ago it was the fashion for culprits to 
appear on the scaffold in the dress of dandies. Some 
centuries before, it was the privilege of noblemen, if 
they merited hanging, to escape the gallows, and 
perish on the block. The Syrian priests had foretold 
to the emperor Heliogabalus, that he would be reduced 
to the necessity of committing suicide; believing them 
true prophets, he kept in readiness silken cords and a 
sword of gold. Admirable privilege of the nobility, to 
be beheaded instead of hanged! Enviable prerogative 
of imperial dignity, to be strangled with a knot of silk, 
or to be assassinated with a golden sword! 

Odious ! in woollen 1 ’twould a saint provoke, 

(Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke.) 

No, let a charming chintz, and Brussels lace 
Wrap my cold limbs, and shade my lifeless face; 
One would not sure be frightful when one’s dead. 
And—Betty—give this cheek a little red. 

The example chosen by the poet, extended to ap¬ 
pearances after death; for the presence of the same 
weakness in the hour of mortality we must look to 
the precincts of courts, where folly used to reign by 
prescriptive right; where caprice gives law and pleas¬ 
ures consume life. There you may witness the har¬ 
lot’s euthanasia. The Erench court was at Choisy, 
when Madame de Pompadour felt the pangs of a fatal 


90 


KULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


malady. It had been the established etiquette, that none 
but princes and persons of royal blood should breathe 
their last in Versailles. Proclaim to the gay circles of 
Paris, that a thing, new and imheard of, is to be per¬ 
mitted! Announce to the world, that the rules of 
palace propriety and Bourbon decorum are to be 
broken 1 that the chambers, where vice had fearlessly 
lived and laughed, but never been permitted to expire, 
were to admit the novel spectacle of the king’s favorite 
mistress, struggling with death. 

The marchioness questioned the physicians firmly; 
she perceived their hesitation; she saw the hand that 
beckoned her away; and she determined, says the his¬ 
torian, to depart in the pomp of a queen. Louis XV., 
himself not capable of a strong emotion, was yet 
willing to concede to his dying friend the consolation 
which she coveted, the opportunity to reign till her part¬ 
ing gasp. The courtiers thronged round the death-bed 
of a woman, who distributed favors with the last exha¬ 
lations of her breath; and the king hurried to name to 
public offices the persons whom her faltering accents 
recommended. Her sick room became a scene of state; 
the princes and grandees still entered to pay their 
homage to the woman whose power did not yield to 
mortal disease, and were surprised to find her ricldy 
attired. The traces of death in her countenance were 
concealed by rouge. She reclined on a splendid 
couch; questions of public policy were discussed by 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


91 


ministers in her presence; she gloried in holding to 
the end the reins of the kingdom in her hands. Even 
a sycophant clergy showed respect to the expiring 
favorite; and felt no shame at sanctioning with their 
frequent visits the vices of a woman who had entered 
the palace only as an adulteress. Having complied 
with the rites of the Roman church, she next sought 
the approbation of the philosophers. She lisped no 
word of penitence; she shed no tears of regret. The 
curate left her as she was in the agony: “Wait 
a moment,’’ said she, “we will leave the house to¬ 
gether.” 

The dying mistress was worshipped while she 
breathed; hardly was she dead when the scene changed; 
two domestics carried out her body on a hand-barrow 
from the palace to her private home. The king stood 
at the window, looking at the clouds, as her remains 
were carried by. “ The Marchioness,” said he, “ will 
have bad weather on her journey.” 


VI. 

The flickering lamp blazes with unusual brightness, 
just as it goes out. “ The fit gives vigor, as it destroys.” 
He who has but a moment remaining, is released from 
the common motives for dissimulation; and time, that 
lays his hand on every thing else, destroying beauty, 
undermining health, and wasting the powers of life, 


92 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


spares the ruling passion, which is connected with the 
soul itself. That passion 

Sticks to our last sand. 

Consistent in our follies and our sins, 

Here honest nature ends as she begins. 

Napoleon expired during the raging of a whirlwind, 
and his last words showed that his thoughts were in 
the battle-field. The meritorious author of the Memoir 
of Cabot, a work which in accuracy and in extensive 
research is very far superior to most late treatises on 
maritime discovery, tells us, that the discoverer of our 
continent, in a hallucination before his death, befieved 
himself again on the ocean, once more steering in quest 
of adventure over waves, which knew him as the steed 
knows its rider. How many a gentle eye has been 
dimmed with tears, as it read the fabled fate of Fergus 
Macivor! Not inferior to the admirable hero of the 
romance, was the Marquis of Montrose, who had 
fought for the Stuarts, and fell into the hands of the 
Presbyterians. His head and his limbs were ordered 
to be severed from his body, and to be hanged on the 
Tolbooth in Edinburgh, and in other public towns of 
the kingdom. He listened to the sentence with the 
pride of loyalty and the fierce anger of a generous de¬ 
fiance. ‘‘ I wish,” he exclaimed, “ I had flesh enough 
to be sent to every city in Christendom, as a testimony 
to the cause for which I suffer.” 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


93 


But let us take an example of sublimer virtue, such 
as we find in a statesman, who lived without a stain 
from youth to maturity, and displayed an unwavering 
consistency to the last; a hero in civil life, who was in 
some degree our own. It becomes America to take 
part in rescuing from undeserved censure the names 
and the memory of victims to the unconquerable love 
of republican liberty. 

Vane, young in years, in counsel old: to know 
Both spiritual power and civil, what each means. 
What severs each, thou st learned, which few have done. 

The bounds of either sword to thee we owe; 
Therefore on thy firm hand rehgion leans 
In peace, and reckons thee her eldest son. 

He, that would discern the difference between 
magnanimous genius and a shallow wit, may com¬ 
pare this splendid eulogy of Milton with the superficial 
levity in the commentary of Warton. It is a fashion 
to call Sir Henry Vane a fanatic. And what is fanat¬ 
icism ? True, he was a rigid Calvinist. True, he has 
written an obscure book on the mystery of godhness, 
of which all that we understand is excellent, and we 
may, therefore, infer that the vein of the rest is good. 
But does this prove him a fanatic ? If to be the un¬ 
compromising defender of civil and religious hberfcy be 
fanaticism; if to forgive injuries be fanaticism; if to 
believe that the mercy of God extends to all his 
creatures, and may reach even the angels of dark- 


94 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


ness, be fanaticism; if to have earnestly supported 
in the Long Parliament the freedom of conscience,— 
if to have repeatedly, boldly and zealously interposed 
to check the persecution of Roman Catholics,—^if to 
have labored that the sect which he least approved, 
should enjoy their property in security, and be 
safe from all penal enactments for non-conformity,—^if 
in his public life to have pursued a career of firm, con¬ 
scientious, disinterested consistency, never wavering, 
never trimming, never changing,—if all this be fanat¬ 
icism, then was Sir Harry Vane a fanatic. Not other¬ 
wise. The people of Massachusetts declined to con¬ 
tinue him in office; and when his power in England 
was great, he requited the Colony with the benefits of 
his favoring influence. He resisted the arbitrariness of 
Charles I., but would not sit as one of his judges. 
He opposed the tyranny of Cromwell. When that 
extraordinary man entered the House of Commons 
to break up the Parliament, which was about to 
pass laws that would have endangered his supremacy. 
Vane rebuked him for his purpose of treason. When 
the musketeers invaded the hall of debate, and others 
were silent. Vane exclaimed to the most despotic man 
in Europe, “ This is not honest. It is against morality 
and common honesty.’’ Well might Cromwell, since 
his designs were criminal, reply, “ Sir Henry Vane! 
Sir Henry Vane 1 The Lord deliver me fi:om Sir 
Henry Vane.” 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


95 


Though Vane suffered from the usurpation of the 
Protector, he lived to see the Restoration. On the 
return of the Stuarts, like Lafayette among the Bour¬ 
bons, he remained the stanch enemy of tyranny. The 
austere patriot, whom Cromwell had feared, struck 
terror into the hearts of a faithless and hcentious court. 
It was resolved to destroy him. In a different age or 
country the poisoned cup, or the knife of the assassin, 
might have been used; in that season of corrupt in¬ 
fluence, a judicial murder was resolved upon. His death 
was a dehberate crime, contrary to the royal promise; 
contrary to the express vote of ‘‘the healing par¬ 
liament ; contrary to law, to equity, to the evidence. 
But it suited the designs of a monarch, who feared to 
be watched by a statesman of incorruptible elevation 
of character. The night before his execution, he en¬ 
joyed the society of his family, as if he had been re¬ 
posing in his own mansion. The next morning he 
was beheaded. The least concession would have saved 
him. If he had only consented to deny the supremacy 
of parliament, the king would have restrained the malig¬ 
nity of his hatred. “ Ten thousand deaths for me,” ex¬ 
claimed Vane, “ ere I will stain the purity of my con¬ 
science.” Historians report that life was dear to him; 
he submitted to his end with the firmness of a patriot, 
the serenity of a Christian. 

“ I give and I devise,” (Old Eucho said, 

And sighed,) “my lands and tenements to Ned.” 


96 


EULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


Yoiir money, sir ?—“ My money, sir! what all ? 
Why,—if I must,’’—(then wept,) ‘‘ I give it Paul.” 
The manor, sir ?—“ The manor! hold,” he cried, 

“ Not that,—I cannot part with that,”-—and died. 

Lorenzo de Medici, upon his death-bed, sent for 
Savonarola to receive his confession and grant him 
absolution. The severe anchorite questioned the dying 
sinner with unsparing rigor. ‘‘ Do you believe entirely 
in the mercy of God ? ”—Yes, I feel it in my 
heart.” — “Are you truly ready to restore all the 
possessions and estates which you have unjustly ac¬ 
quired ? ”—The dying Duke hesitated; he counted up 
in his mind the sums which he had hoarded; delusion 
whispered that nearly all had been so honestly gained, 
that the sternest censor would strike but httle from his 
opulence. The pains of hell were threatened if he 
denied; and he gathered courage to reply, that he was 
ready to make restitution. Once more the unyielding 
priest resumed his inquisition. “ Will you resign the 
sovereignty of Plorence, and restore the democracy of 
the republic ? ” Lorenzo, like Macbeth, had acquired 
a crown; but, unlike Macbeth, he saw sons of his own 
about to become his successors. He gloried in the 
hope of being the father of princes, the founder of a 
hne of hereditary sovereigns. Should he crush this 
brilliant expectation, and tremble at the wild words 
of a visionary? Should he who had reigned as a 
monarch, stoop to die as a merchant? No 1 though 


EULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


97 


hell itself were opening beneath his bed. ‘‘Not that! 
I cannot part with that.’' Savonarola left his bedside 
mth indignation, and Lorenzo died without shrift. 

And you brave Cobham, to the latest breath, 

Shall feel your ruling passion strong in death, 

Such in those moments as in aU the past,— 

“ Oh ! save my country. Heaven ! ” shall be your last. 

Like this was the exclamation of the patriot 
Quincy, whose virtues have been fitly commemorated 
by the pious reverence of his son. The celebrated 
Admiral Blake breathed his last as he came in sight 
of England, happy in at least descrying the land, of 
which he had advanced the glory by his brilliant 
victories. Quincy died as he approached the coast of 
Massachusetts. He loved his family; but at that 
moment he gave his whole soul to the cause of free¬ 
dom. “Oh that I might five,”—^it was his dying 
wish,—“ to render to my country one last service.” 

VII. 

The coward falls panic-stricken; the superstitious 
man dies with visions of terror fioating before his 
fancy. It has even happened that a man has been 
in such dread of eternal woe, as to cut his throat in his 
despair. The phenomenon seems strange; but the fact 
is unquestionable. The giddy, that are near a preci¬ 
pice, totter towards the brink which they would shun. 
Every body remembers the atheism and bald sensuality 
7 


98 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


of the septuagenarian Alexander VI.; and the name 
of his natural son, Caesar Borgia, is a proverb, as a 
synonym for the most vicious selfishness. Let one 
tale, of which MacchiaveUi attests the truth, set forth the 
deep baseness of a cowardly nature. Borgia had, by 
the most solemn oaths, induced the Duke of Gravina, 
Oliverotto, Vitellozzo Vitelli, and another, to meet him 
in Senigaglia, for the purpose of forming a treaty, and 
then issued the order for the massacre of Oliverotto 
and Vitelli. Can it be believed? Vitelli, as he 
expired, begged of the infamous Borgia, his assassin, 
to obtain of Alexander a dispensation for his omis¬ 
sions,, a release from purgatory. 

The death-bed of Cromwell himself was not free 
from superstition. When near his end, he asked if the 
elect could never fall. “ Never,’’ replied Godwin the 
preacher. “Then am I safe,” said the man whose 
last years had been stained by cruelty and tyranny; 
“ for I am sure I was once in a state of grace.” 

Ximenes languished from disappointment at the 
loss of power and the want of royal favor. A smile 
from Louis would have cheered the death-bed of 
Bacine. 

In a brave mind the love of honor endm^es to the 
last. “Don’t give up the ship,” cried Lamence, as 
his life-blood was flowing in torrents. Abimelech 
groaned that he fell ignobly by the hand of a woman. 
We have ever admired the gallant death of Sir Richard 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


99 


Grenville, who, in a single ship, encountered a nu¬ 
merous fleet; and when mortally wounded, husbanded 
his strength, till he could summon his victors to bear 
testimony to his courage and his patriotism. ‘‘ Here 
die I, Richard Grenville, with a joyous and quiet mind, 
for that I have ended my life as a true soldier ought to 
do, flghting for his country, queen, rehgion and honor.” 

The public has been instructed through the press 
in the details of the treason of Benedict Arnold, by an 
inquirer, who has compassed earth and sea in search of 
historic truth, and has merited the applause of his 
country, not less for candor and judgment, than for 
diligence and abihty. The victim of the intrigue was 
Andre. The mind of the young soldier revolted at the 
service of treachery in which he had become involved, 
and holding a stain upon honor to be worse than the 
forfeiture of hfe, he shuddered at the sight of the gal¬ 
lows, but not at the thought of dying. He felt the 
same sentiment which made death welcome to Nelson 
and to Wolfe, to whom it came with glory and victory 
for its companions ; but for Andre, the keen sense of 
honor added bitterness to the cup of affliction, by 
exciting fear lest the world should take the manner of 
his execution as evidence of merited opprobrium. 

vni. 

Finally : he who has a good conscience and awell 
balanced mind meets death mth calmness, resignation. 


100 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


and hope. Saint Louis died among the ruins of 
Carthage; a Christian king, laboring in vain to expel 
the religion of Mahomet from the spot where Dido 
had planted the gods of Syria. ‘‘ My friends,” said 
he, I have finished my course. Do not mourn for 
me. It is natural that I, as your chief and leader, 
should go before you. You must follow me. Keep 
yourselves in readiness for the journey.” Then giving 
his son his blessing and the best advice, he received 
the sacrament, closed his eyes, and died, as he was re¬ 
peating from the Psalms, I will come into thy house; 
I will worship in thy holy temple.” 

The curate of St. Sulpice asked the confessor Avho 
had shrived Montesquieu on his death-bed, if the peni¬ 
tent had given satisfaction. ‘‘ Yes,” replied father 
Roust, ‘‘ like a man of genius.” The curate was dis¬ 
pleased ; unwilling to leave the dying man a moment 
of tranquillity, he addressed him, “ Sir, are you truly 
conscious of the greatness of God ? ” “ Yes,” said 

the departing philosopher, ‘‘and of the littleness of 
man.” 

How calm were the last moments of Cuvier ! 
Benevolence of feeling and self-possession diffused 
serenity round the hour of his passing away. Con¬ 
fident that the hand of death was upon him, he yet 
submitted to the application of remedies, that he might 
gratify his more hopeful friends. They had recourse 
to leeches; and with delightful simplicity the great 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


101 


naturalist observed, it was he loho had discovered that 
leeches possess red blood. The discovery, which he 
made in his youth, had been communicated to the pub¬ 
lic in the memoir that first gained him celebrity. The 
thoughts of the dying naturalist recurred to the 
scenes of his early life, to the coast of Normandy, 
where, in the solitude of conscious genius, he had 
roamed by the side of the ocean, and achieved 
fame by observing the wonders of animal life 
which are nourished in its depths. He remembered 
his years of poverty, the sullen rejection which his first 
claims for advancement had received, and all the 
vicissitudes through which he had been led to the 
highest distinctions in science. The son of the 
Wirtemberg soldier, of too feeble a frame to em¬ 
brace the profession of his father, had found his way 
to the secrets of nature. The man who, in his own 
province, had been refused the means of becoming the 
village pastor of an ignorant peasantry, had succeeded 
in charming the most polished circles of Paris by the 
clearness of his descriptions, and commanding the 
attention of the Deputies of Prance by the grace 
and fluency of his elocution. And now he was 
calmly predicting his departure; his respiration be¬ 
came rapid; and his head fell as if he were in med¬ 
itation. Thus his soul passed to its Creator without a 
struggle. ‘‘ Those who entered afterwards Avould 
have thought that the noble old man, seated in his 


102 


RULING PASSION IN DEATH. 


arm-chair by the fire-place, was asleep; and would 
have walked softly across the room for fear of dis¬ 
turbing him.” Heaven had but ‘‘ recalled its own.” 

The death of Haller himself was equally tranquil. 
When its hour approached, he watched the ebbing of 
life and continued to observe the beating of his pulse 
till sensation was gone. 

A tranquil death becomes the man of science, or 
the scholar. He should cultivate letters to the last 
moment of life; he should resign public honors, as 
calmly as one would take off a domino on returning 
from a mask. He should listen to the signal for his 
departure, not with exultation, and not with indiffer¬ 
ence. Respecting the dread solemnity of the change, 
and reposing in hope on the bosom of death, he should 
pass, without boldness and without fear, from the 
struggles of inquiry to the certainty of knowledge, 
from a world of doubt to a world of truth. 


STUDIES IN GERMAN LITERATURE. 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 

I. 

National literature varies with national char¬ 
acter. It represents the aspect under which the world 
is contemplated, and shows the coloring imparted by 
climate, government, and society. The Muse, with 
her divine inventions, may shape the character of a 
people after a favorite pattern of ideal excellence; but 
the beauty, concentrated in the model, must have 
already existed in surrounding realities, which imagi¬ 
nation only combines and vivifies. The hearts of the 
many 'will not be moved, except the appeal be made 
to passions which are already strong, and gratify 
tastes and awaken sympathies wliich are already 
formed. 

The literature of a nation, therefore, commends it¬ 
self to the attention of enlightened curiosity, even inde¬ 
pendently of its intrinsic merits, from the knowledge it 
sheds on the nature of man. Genius remains always 


104 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


the same high gift. But how differently has it 
ripened under the grateful splendor of an Italian sky, 
and in the chilling climate of the North! at the court 
of Louis, and on the soil of Germany! at Edinburgh 
and Ispahan ! at Vienna and Washington ! And this 
diversity gives relief to the productions of each nation, 
and constitutes their interchange a reciprocity of bene¬ 
fits and gratifications. We censure the extravagant 
creations of oriental fancy, and yet the East has given 
to the West more than it has received. It has peopled 
the air with sylphs, and filled the world of man with « 
magic agencies ; it contributed many a strange tale to 
be wrought into beautiful shape by the more careful 
European artist. In the Eairy Queen, to glance only 
at English literature, something of its manner was 
blended with Spenser’s sweetness and melancholy; 
and it adds vivacity to the playful satue of Pope. The 
story of the Merchant of Venice is of Eastern origin; 
and the Tempest and the Midsummer Night’s Dream 
borrow their charms from the brilliant legends of the 
same chme. Thus it is, that while learning blesses 
its possessors, the stores which it collects and dispenses, 
contribute to the general instruction and amusement. 

A universal interest and extended culture favor not 
the variety of literary productions only, but also the 
culture of taste. They are necessary to the acquisition 
of just discrimination, and the quick perception and 
ready acknowledgment of merit. There may be an 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 


105 


intuitive perception of excellence, but it is only from 
large comparisons that we arrive at safe inferences. 
The mind that takes a wide range, is willing to observe 
the manner in which genius contemplates nature under 
every sky and in every condition of life; it gains the 
power of recognising beauty of invention, by what¬ 
ever disguise the public fashions of place and time 
may have hid its lustre. 

The freedom capable of discerning beauty in 
writing, independent of local peculiarities, is a vic¬ 
tory over prejudice and narrowness. Its reward is 
vast and immediate, and consists in the power of 
receiving enjoyment from every exhibition of genius. 
Perhaps no people offers in its literature more nume¬ 
rous or more opposite causes of gratification than the 
Germans. Others may surpass them in melody of 
verse, or exact and measured elegance; but never 
before did the world behold a nation matm’e, in a 
century, a literature so diversified in its character, 
marked by so much learning and so much liberality, 
so full of thought and imagination, so distinguished 
alike for philosophical reasoning, and the boldest 
expression of enthusiastic feeling. 

The aspect of nature is reflected in German liter¬ 
ature. In Italy, the Apennines, for the most part 
scantily wooded, or even entirely naked, rise in beau¬ 
tiful and successive ranges; the clear atmosphere lends 
to them distinct outlines, and shows to perfect advan- 


106 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


tage the intermingling of light and shade on the suc¬ 
cession of hills and valleys; and the spectator willingly 
lends an ear to the fables of antiquity. It seems no 
unnatural idea, that the cheerful brooks and the invi¬ 
ting woods should have joyous nymphs and deities for 
their guardians. In Germany, the mountains are 
carefully kept covered with the forest, whose sombre 
foliage heightens their aspect of gloom; or the thin 
branches of the pines make the rugged cliffs appear 
stm more bleak and desolate; the mists often gather 
among the ridges, or wrap the highest peaks in clouds; 
the productions of the soil, at any considerable eleva¬ 
tion, mark an inhospitable zone, and indicate the 
abject poverty of the inhabitants; and so a rude super¬ 
stition has assigned to these northern fastnesses the 
homes of wizards and spectres; the theatre of noctur¬ 
nal incantations; the general muster-ground of all the 
motley and fiendish creations of a barbarous fancy. 

The history of Germany is unique, and has had 
its influence on its poets. In many parts of the coun¬ 
try, especially along the Rhine and the Neckar, and on 
the heights which command the rich valleys of central 
Germany, the genius of the middle ages is still visibly 
hovering round 

‘‘ Those gray but leafy walls, where ruin greenly dwells.” 
There you have the battlements and the massive watch- 
towers of the baronial castles, the dungeons and sub¬ 
terraneous passages, the banqueting halls and the 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 


107 


chapels, which are so often introduced into romance, 
and which in themselves are far more touching in their 
decay, than in the descriptions of any writer of fiction. 
You may inspect the very chambers of the secret 
tribunal, its instruments of torture, and its places of 
execution; or hsten to the simple and pure legends 
which religious tradition has connected with the scenes 
of greatest loveliness. Of these mediaeval relics, enough 
remains to give clear conceptions of the manners 
of those times, in which the fierceness of chivalrous 
courage was tempered by the influence of the Church, 
and the harshness of the haughty knight contrasted 
with the impressive piety and graceful gentleness of 
woman. When we are admitted to the inner apart¬ 
ments and see, as it were, the daily footsteps of their 
inhabitants, we are brought nearer to the incidents of 
feudal power; the anxious lady of the castle is still im¬ 
patiently hearkening for the return of her lord; the 
courtyard yet rings with the clattering of arms, the 
neighing of steeds, and the loud merriment of a numer¬ 
ous and idle retinue; the wine still flows freely at the 
hospitable but intemperate banquet; the priest chastens 
the fierceness of valor with mercy, absolves the timid 
sold from the gudt of sin, and at the altar sanctifies to 
youthful prowess the possession of beauty, whose afiec- 
tion was won by courage in the field. 


108 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


II. 

The political organization of Germany, after many 
changes, continues to be a strange anomaly. Its soil, 
occupying the very heart of Europe, has been the 
general battle-field for contending nations, while its 
princely fafiiilies have for centuries furnished wives to 
more than half the sovereigns of Europe. Its climate 
and soil vary, as you pass from the barren sands, cold 
seasons, and level regions of the North, to the mag¬ 
nificence of the country watered by the Danube, or the 
genial mildness and abundance that crown the valley 
of the Rhine. Had its hardy population been bound 
together under one master, the liberty of the old world 
would have been at their mercy. But even the ap¬ 
pearance of an executive union was destined to disap¬ 
pear in the revolutionary convulsions of Europe. The 
line of Roman emperors has ceased, and the phantom 
of a crown is worn no longer. Letters are now the 
great, and we might almost say, the only efiicient 
bond for the German people. They have a common 
language, and a common literature ; in other respects, 
their governments are severally nearly as independent 
as those of the Italian States. The German league 
forms little beside a vain show. The interests of the 
several states are heterogeneous, and the connection 
but nominal; while Goethe is the man of the whole 
nation, a favorite at Vienna, and on the left bank of 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 


109 


the Rhine. A strange condition of public existence! 
where there are no topics relating to the whole com¬ 
monwealth, to call forth an undivided expression of 
feeling; and yet where works of genius in literature 
are claimed by a population of more than forty millions. 

The inhabitants of Germany are every where distin¬ 
guished for kindliness and hospitality. Here are the 
strongholds of Protestantism; and here too, Roman 
Catholics worship in sincerity, and delight in learning; 
while religion discards alike bigotry and superstition. 
That the fine arts are held in high repute, is attested 
by the enthusiasm which the Gallery of Dresden con¬ 
tinues to excite. Music is so universally cultivated, 
that there is no considerable town where admirable 
concerts may not be heard in private circles; nor is 
afiection confined to Mozart and native composers; 
sometimes the touching strains of the elder artists are 
revived; of Scarlatti, who composed and played the 
harp till almost seventy; but still more of Palestrina, 
whose ashes were deemed worthy of a place in St. 
Peter’s,—^the Raphael of music, than whom no one has 
better known how to express the spirit of rehgion by 
the harmony of sounds. 

The tendency of the wide diffusion of culture to 
promote intellectual freedom, is increased by the fact, 
that in the Northern and Central parts of Germany 
there is but one very large city; while Vienna is too 
near the confines of the ancient Empire to form a cen- 


110 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


tre for the mind of the nation. Indeed, an impulse 
greater than any from Vienna, has been given by 
Weimar, a city not so large, and certainly not so 
flourishing as was the town of Providence, or Cincinnati, 
in 1827. The public, that invisible, most powerful, im¬ 
partial personification of the enlightened opinion and 
authority of a nation, is in Germany, as in the United 
States, to be sought for every where. In every village, 
cultivated minds are unfettered by the decisions of a 
metropolis, and opinions are freely given and boldly 
canvassed. The fate of a book pubhshed in Prance, is 
decided at Paris; but in Germany, the highest honors 
in letters, as with us the presidential dignity, are to be 
won only by obtaining the free sufirages of remote, in¬ 
dependent, and equal districts. 

The arrangements of the bookselling interest are 
analogous. Leipzig is the great centre of this busi¬ 
ness ; in Leipzig, every book, be it published where it 
may, is advertised and kept regularly for sale. Nothing 
is so sure of a good reception, as to pretend to make 
its way by itself, independent of the usual mode ; and 
nothing so small or so mean, as to be overlooked. So 
perfect is the system, you may receive of the smallest 
bookseller, in the smallest town that has a bookseller, 
any work published in any part of the country, as 
surely, as soon, and on as good tenns, as if you had 
applied to the house most largely engaged in the 
trade. Nor is it unworthy of remark, that the 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 


Ill 


common style of printing is a correct, but not an 
expensive one. 


III. 

There is the more advantage in economical arrange¬ 
ments for distributing books tlu-ough Germany, as 
learning is there seldom attended by wealth and inde¬ 
pendence. German hterature is the result of the 
moral energy of its own votaries. It was fostered 
by no Maecenas; it was cherished by no Augustus; 
it was not rocked and dandled into maturity, but 
struggled against opposition, overcame indifference, 
and triumphed over contempt. Even Leibnitz, at 
comparatively a recent day, had the weakness not to 
be proud of his countrymen; and Erederic of Prus¬ 
sia could not perceive the germs of that genius, which 
in his last years was to bloom so abundantly. It 
was the mass of the nation that wrought out the 
intellectual salvation of the country; and hence it 
comes, that men of letters in Germany, emerging from 
the middling class, have had their S 3 nnpathies with the 
people, and have watched for its hberties. To the 
aristocracy, Germany owes little of its intellectual eleva¬ 
tion. 

Of this it is proudly conscious. It is not of the 
slightest moment, whether the presence of the learned and 
of those endowed with, creative genius is desired among 
the possessors of political or hereditary rank. Wlio 


112 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


asks if Homer kept company with kings? Who is 
troubled because Milton would not, or could not go to 
court ? An ingenious scholar of the North, whose 
merits are above our praise, observes, as a favorable 
characteristic of our time, that authors ‘‘ constitute the 
chosen ornaments of society.’’ It may be well for the 
classes which are privileged by fortune, to associate to 
themselves the eloquent who can sway pubhc opinion, 
or the masters of science who can produce new re¬ 
sources of power or wealth. But the willing parasite 
ranks infinitely beneath the stem recluse, whose mind, 
self-balanced, finds repose in its own strength. Men 
of letters belong essentially to the laboring class; they 
are links in the chain which binds together the widely 
diversified elements of society. They rise from the 
general mass and should not separate from it. All the 
delight of vanity in counting the powerful, the wealthy 
or the fashionable as friends, should never induce them 
to resign their right to equality on the field of general 
exertion,—^founded, as their claim is, on the glory of 
inspiring the thoughts, and moulding the moral exist¬ 
ence of contemporary millions. Such is the sentiment 
of the German universities, where a want of manliness 
is not forgiven. A professor had received a diploma of 
nobility. ‘‘ Ah,” said his colleague, the mathematician 
Kastner, on the arrival of the parchment; the fellow 
rises on the ruins of his like; one foohsh sheep builds 
his greatness on the skin of another.” 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 


113 


It would be melancholy to foUow the lives of emi¬ 
nent German scholars through their trials in the com¬ 
mencement of their career, were it not that we may 
almost always discern the hopeful serenity proceeding 
from the conscious exercise of exalted intellect. Many of 
them provided at first for their subsistence, by filling 
subordinate stations in schools; to many the universities 
offered a temporary theatre, or a scene of honor and 
exertion for life. The admirable constitution of the 
German universities, rendered it the more easy to ap¬ 
pear there in the capacity of public instructor. In 
them the care of the several branches of science is 
not exclusively intrusted to any one. The regular 
professor is liable to find competitors in any, whose 
predilections or whose wants may lead them to instruct 
in the same department. The few establishments 
where the system of restraint prevails, have had little 
or no share in the prosperity, vigorous industry, and 
sound and impartial learning, for which the German 
is distinguished. According to its theory the busi¬ 
ness of teaching should be as free as mth us the prac¬ 
tice of law. To insure the co-operation of some one 
eminent man in each department, a regular professor 
is appointed, with a veiy moderate salary, which ope¬ 
rates only as a bounty, to influence his choice of 
abode. His income depends on his industry and 
success, and is as unlimited as his talents and reputa¬ 
tion. Beside this, any man, who can offer evidence of 
8 


114 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


his competency, by an examination, a public disputa¬ 
tion, and a printed dissertation, that may serve as a 
specimen of his erudition, is allowed to give public or 
private lessons, under the sanction of the university, 
with every facility to be derived from the use of its 
fixtures, and with all the advantage of being fairly in 
the list of equal competition. 

Here, mark the difference in om^ institutions. 
With us all instruction in the universities is monop¬ 
olized; whether the professorship derives its income 
from fees paid by the students, or endowments, the 
care of each branch of knowledge is entirely in the 
hands of the person appointed; he has no competitor. 

In Germany the professor has his salary; the right 
to teach, and to gain emolmnents from teaching, he 
shares with all who have the requisite qualifications. 
There are not a few men in America now, who have 
no connection with any of our public institutions, and 
who could not, of their own accord alone, enter on the 
career of instruction in them, who yet have a right, that 
would not be disputed, of teaching the sciences public- ^ 
ly, and at will, in any one of the leading German uni¬ 
versities. It may be thought, that this liberty of 
teaching is fruitful of endless strife and undignified 
jealousies. Ear from it. It makes the public teachers 
industrious and faithful, for otherwise they would soon 
be out of employment; and it is no more productive 
of evil, than the custom among us, of a young lawyer 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 


115 


or physician attempting to practise his profession in 
any place where he thinks an opportunity offers. The 
established professors find nothing grievous in the 
arrangement. Now and then, it is true, a professor 
who remains behind the age, or has httle talent as a 
teacher, is doomed to see his lecture-room vacant, and 
offer instruction which no one cares to receive. And 
so it ought to be. But a faithful man derives such an 
advantage from his regular appointment, that to him 
his youthful competitors are but as followers and coad¬ 
jutors, who give assistance to the students in those 
things for which he has neither time nor inchnation. 
A competitor of equal years and standing is unknown, 
except as a professor likewise regularly estabhshed; 
for talent and learning are not such every-day qualities 
as to be left unsought for. When a professor dies, or 
is incapacitated by age, the public has the benefit of being 
able to select a successor from the crowd of young and 
experienced aspirants. And if, which 'will sometimes 
happen, the regular professor grows idle, the science 
does not droop; the want of instruction calls forth per¬ 
sons competent to give it; and the public is not a 
great loser by any misappropriations, since the receipts 
of a teacher fall off with the decline of his own exertions. 

Nor let it be supposed that the universities, which 
have had so wide an influence on the culture of man¬ 
kind, are all of them hallowed by age. Gottingen is 
but of the last century, though it has already gathered 


116 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


the most useful library in the world. The foundation 
of the University of Berlin belongs to the present cen¬ 
tury ; and the number of its students has, at times, 
been the largest on the continent. Within a year of the 
foundation of a university at Munich, in 1826, its success 
was assured. But how were those foundations laid ? 
Not by building halls, but by collecting together learned 
men, and opening to them a career of utility, honor, 
and emolument. Honos et^rcemia ! Where these are 
dispensed freely, learning will thrive; industry, un¬ 
checked in its exertions, and unlimited in its rewards, 
win in this, as in every thing else, lead to briUiant results. 

It would not be without interest to glance at the 
condition of our country, and form an estimate of 
the character of men who would become public in¬ 
structors, if our institutions were put on a similar 
liberal footing; the relative number of those, who, in 
this country and in Gennany, are desirous of a public 
education; the influence of the respective govern¬ 
ments ; the liberality of the community. But the sub¬ 
ject is too important to be treated incidentally; and 
we will only remark, that if our universities languish, 
the cause does not lie in the apathy of the public. 

The influence of the German universities is incalcu¬ 
lable. They fill the offices of state with men of cul¬ 
ture ; and there is hardly a village where they have not 
domesticated learning. They give an earnest and 
speculative character to the common mind; render 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 


117 


the public capable of appreciating eminent merit, and 
impress even on the works of fiction, traces of an 
intimate acquaintance with other ages and nations. A 
union of strength of imagination with the power of 
various acquisition, is characteristic of German genius. 


IV. 

Letters are in Germany a career to which men are 
regularly educated. The profession is, moreover, a 
thronged one; of course, moderate merit is abundant, 
and distinction difficult. There are few instances of 
scholars who have at once risen to eminence. The first 
years on entering life are generally years of hardship 
and struggle; but where talent is joined to industry, 
notoriety is at last gained, and a moderate competence 
secured. There is nothing in our country more nearly 
analogous to this state of things, than the condition 
of the profession of law. The road of emulation is so 
crowded, that it is unsafe to rest upon hon6rs already 
acquired; persevering diligence is necessary to pre¬ 
serve even a favorite from neglect. German scholars 
understand that there is much hard work to be done, 
requiring time and habitual toil, from day to day; 
letters are not to be the pastime of a dull afternoon— 
the business over which a man may loll in an easy 
chair—the fashionable topic for a half hour’s conver¬ 
sation in the evening; they are considered, as they 


118 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


ought to be, a most honorable and most laborious 
occupation for life. 

To these habits of industry we must attribute the 
profoundness and the universahty which characterize 
German hterature. In almost every department of 
human knowledge, it can show some one treatise, 
which may be said to exhaust the subject; containing 
not the views of the author merely, but a condensed 
sketch of all that has been written upon the matter in 
discussion. 

There is one branch of speculative learning, requir¬ 
ing rare sagacity and dehberation, and cultivated but 
little except in Germany. It is called the Higher 
Criticism, and begins its office where historical criti¬ 
cism ends. Thus, as to the poems of Homer, all the 
evidence which we possess, enables us only to establish 
the essential identity of our printed copies with the 
edition collated and published by the Alexandrian 
scholars. But what changes may have taken place in 
the verse, previous to that period ? What proof have 
we that the Alexandrian scholars had an uncorrupted 
text? The same kind of questions has been raised 
in theological philology. It is obvious, that to ask 
them of the rash, is only to throw open the floodgates 
of literary doubt. And in fact, there has been left 
hardly one eminent author of antiquity, who has not 
been cheated out of part of his fame. Sophocles is 
made to give up one of his plays ; Plato half his dia- 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 


119 


logues; Anacreon almost all his odes; and the Iliad 
and the Odyssey are declared to be full of interpola¬ 
tions, the shreds and rags of audacious sophists, 
patched upon the simple and majestic robes'of Ho¬ 
mer. The too great prevalence of this dangerous 
method has given to a branch of science an air of 
skepticism, which was not the object of the writers, 
and which by no means exists in the people. 

The same spirit of expansive inquiry, which does 
the business of research so faithfully, has encouraged a 
universal interest in literary productions. The great 
works of other countries and ages are not merely 
known to the man of letters, but are for the most part 
nationalized in translations which give the very form 
and sentiments, the ideas and the tone of the original. 
We should mention Wolf’s German translation of the 
Clouds of Aristophanes, and William von Humboldt’s 
of the Agamemnon of JEschylus, as admirable speci¬ 
mens of this kind of work, of which Voss may be 
called the inventor. Where such fidelity is required, 
the style was at first harsh; but long and frequent 
exercise, and unceasing efforts, have given such flex¬ 
ibility, copiousness, and variety to the German lan¬ 
guage, that many of the greatest poets of all times, not 
the ancients only, but Calderon and Shakspeare, Tasso, 
Ariosto, and Dante, are reproduced in their own 
measures and their own style, and have become 
familiar topics of interest to all who know how to 


120 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


beguile an hour with a book. So numerous are the 
translations from the Latin and Greek, that a work in 
two large volumes was required for their enumeration. 
All good versions meet with a favorable reception. 
On the theatres, Romeo and Juliet, or the Merchant 
of Venice, of the English dramatist, will draw as large 
a house, and gratify it as much, as the Wallenstein, or 
the Mary Stuart of Schiller. Calderon is played as 
often as Goethe; and even a comedy of Terence is 
sometimes represented. 

This enlarged curiosity increases in an unparalleled 
manner the amount of knowledge in circulation, and 
liberates the general mind from prejudice, without 
impairing the originality of German inventive literature. 
The nation has its own character, which is preserved 
inviolate, though it is strengthened and fructified by 
additions from many sources. 

Independence is a characteristic of German scho¬ 
lars. Controversy is carried on with the utmost free¬ 
dom. Where truth is the object, it is not deemed 
tolerable, that social considerations should check a 
free expression of thought. Hence there is a great 
collision of opinions, as with us in the political world, 
and every one comes finally to be examined. It is not 
esteemed unseemly for men, who reside in the same 
place, or are employed at the same university, to advo¬ 
cate opposite views; and the habit of conducting lit¬ 
erary researches in personal seclusion, encourages the 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 


121 


scholar to unbiased inquiry and boldness of utterance. 
Passing their time in retirement and apphcation, the 
men of letters have little communication with each 
other, or the world, but by their writings. Separated 
from society by continual industry, while they yet hold 
close intercourse with the public through the press, in¬ 
timate relations of friendship, and on the other hand, 
implacable hostilities, may grow up between those who 
have never heard the sound of each other’s voice. 

The continuance of solitary study leads finally to a 
state of high mental excitement. The scholar, within 
the walls of his closet, feels the impulse of passionate mo¬ 
tives, the inish of rapid thought, and the charms of 
crowded existence. Pie represents to himself not a 
distinct, visible, and well-known audience, but a vast 
and undefined mass of intelligence and numbers, an as¬ 
semblage unhmited in its possible extent, and deriving 
new dignity from the awful mystery in which it is en¬ 
veloped. The German scholar wiites under the con¬ 
viction that his work will fall under the eyes of men 
competent to judge, and his usual tranquillity and 
regularity make him the more susceptible of this kind 
of encouragement. 

The remoteness in which the German student lives 
from ordinary interruptions, favors devotedness to a 
single object. The instances are numerous, of men 
who have consecrated the best part of them lives to one 
engrossing pursuit. The science which thus engages 


122 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


tlie mind for years, becomes ever present to their 
thoughts, and is treated with liveliness as well as learn¬ 
ing. There are some who can describe to you the an¬ 
tiquities of Egypt, or the ruins of Persepolis, who may 
hardly know there are republicans among the Andes; 
others have a better understanding of the springs that 
directed the Peloponnesian war, than the Erench revo¬ 
lution. Subjects of antiquity are treated as though 
they were present to the senses; and the lecturer on 
Greece transfers himself and all his interests, for the 
time, to the scenes which he describes. The historian 
of nature, too, lives in his theme; he carries his enthu¬ 
siasm into the details of physiology, and explains with 
animation the wonders of the mineral kingdom ; or, if 
his topic be the fossil remains of the former creation, he 
seems almost to throw his mind back into that wonder¬ 
ful state of things, when plastic power delighted in 
monstrous forms, when trees dropped amber, and in¬ 
sects were enshrined in transparent tombs. 

With much that is excellent, much extravagance 
has been published in Germany, where, in the first ten 
years of this century, there were more than ten thou¬ 
sand living authors. Sentiments bold and paradoxical, 
inventions^ wild and wonderful, sometimes for a season 
engage the attention, which nothing but genius and 
truth can hold fast. But among so many good intel¬ 
lects, error cannot proceed far without opposition, nor 
folly without exposure. The nation does not stand 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS. 


123 


answerable for the aberrations of any of its citizens, 
since it is the first to censure their perversity. 

The facility of receiving enjoyment from every 
exhibition of genius, is an advantage of high value. 
Every man has, indeed, the right to choose his own 
guides to the summit of Olympus; but we question 
the soundness of those who deny that there are more 
ways than one. Such an opinion could be explained, 
only as the result of a narrowness that willingly 
wears the shackles of prejudice. We all admire the 
loveliness of our own landscape ; but shall we 
have no susceptibility to other charms ? Shall Switz¬ 
erland, where the glaciers enter the fertile valley, 
and winter and summer are seen side by side, 
have no power to please us ? Or a scene beneath a 
southern sky, where the palm-trees lift their heads in 
slender magnificence, the forests glitter with the splen¬ 
dor of variegated plumage, and earth is gay with all 
the colors that gain their deep tints from a tropical 
sun ? The eye that communes with nature and under¬ 
stands it, discerns beauty in all its forms. And shall 
we, who are certainly not incurious as to the concerns 
of all nations, be indifferent to foreign letters? Is 
there no happy moment of tranquillity in which learn¬ 
ing may raise her head fearlessly and be respected, and 
the pursuits of contemplative life be cheered by the 
free expression of general approbation, and quickened 
into excellence by the benignity of an attentive nation? 


124 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


We cannot as yet be said to have a national literature; 
but we already have the promise of one, and the first 
fruits; as the literary character of the country is devel¬ 
oped, it should resemble our political institutions in 
liberality, and welcome excellence from every quarter 
of the world. 

THE REVIVAL OF GERMAN LITERATURE. 


I. 

The first use of the German as a written language, 
is full of interest for the antiquary; but, hke the re¬ 
searches into the earliest Anglo-Saxon literature, can 
hardly claim universal attention. No relic has come 
down to us, of the bards of whom Tacitus makes men¬ 
tion. The Edda furnishes but a very doubtful means 
of ascertaining what kind of poetry was in vogue in the 
days of Herman; nor do any existing documents 
explain the changes produced in popular poetry and 
habits of thought by the introduction of Christianity. 
Religious hymns were circulated by the monks; and 
one considerable poem, the Life of St. Anno, by an 
unknown author, wiU long be preserved, not for its 
merit, but as a curious literary production. 

The Suabian period, in Avhich the romance of 
chivalry prevailed, forms the next stage in the progress 
of German poetry. Erom the twelfth to the fourteenth 
century, at least two hundred candidates for fame may 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


125 


be counted. There are not wanting critics, who per¬ 
suade themselves that Homer hardly deserves higher 
esteem than the poets of love and the singers of the 
Nibelungs. But these derive their chief interest from 
the age in which they were produced. The lyric 
pieces of the period, which ring sweet and harmonious 
chimes on the vernal season, the tender passion, and 
devotedness to woman, were mere lispings in the ac¬ 
cents of the Provencal muse. 

In the fourteenth century, the romantic poetry 
degenerated; and the rhymes of the master workmen 
among the several corporations of mechanics became 
all that Germany, for three centuries, could exhibit in 
proof of poetic activity. The knights and warriors had 
had their day; it seemed but just, that that of the 
tradesmen should dawn. Miracles in literature are 
rare; the interminable strains of the rhyming artisans 
may have beguiled their wanderings as apprentices, or 
glorified their respective cities, or professions; but they 
contain little of the spirit of poetry. 

Hans Sachs was a wonder in one sense of the word. 
He wrote more rhjnnes than any person of whom literary 
history makes mention, with the single exception of 
Lope de Vega. Of comedies and tragedies, he com¬ 
posed two hundred and eight; his works, collectively, 
consist of six thousand and forty-eight pieces; the se¬ 
lections of his choicest productions fill three foho vol¬ 
umes ; and he sustained withal the character of a 




126 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


reputable citizen and good sboemaker. Poets may 
find tongues in trees and Avisdom in stones, the 
materials for philosophic verse in the tale of a wagon¬ 
er, or the discourse of a pedler; may illustrate from 
the unlettered hinds of a village all the vices and pas¬ 
sions which can disturb mankind; but it would be 
hard to discern beauty in a play, for example, where 
God is introduced as catechising Abel and his play¬ 
fellows, and the good child answers correctly, according 
to the orthodox manual of the day ; while Cain and his 
party reply hke inattentive boys, who have not half 
learnt their lesson. In his multitudinous works, Hans 
Sachs introduces heroines and heroes of classic an¬ 
tiquity ; soldiers and statesmen ; lovers and poets; 
saints and devils ; men, angels, and women; but they 
aU are made on the same last; they all, both male and 
female, wear the costume of Nuremberg. 

The literature of Germany was destined to sink 
still lower, before its glorious awakening. In the 
seventeenth century a piebald jargon, compounded 
of Latin, and Prench, and German, assumed to be the 
fashion; and pure German, in spite of all its native 
wealth and energy, was derided as rustic, clumsy, and 
ungenteel. The style of the day travestied the borrowed 
words with a domestic termination, and the labored 
periods, admitting here and there the homely expres¬ 
sions of the pure Saxon dialect, resembled some roo;m 
in an old castle, where the sober wainscoting, in its 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


127 


stem and real beauty, is bedizened, and all but wholly 
concealed under second-hand finery. 


II. 

A century ago, original genius was still inactive; 
the propensity to imitate predominant; and the talent 
for imitating exceedingly feeble. The intellectual con¬ 
dition of the empire resembled its political; its native 
energies were impaired by foreign alliances, and the 
German language and literature seemed as much neg¬ 
lected as the permanent interests of the state. The 
style of writing was a diiffuse and pedantic barbarism. 
Nor was there any earnest of a renovation of taste and 
a revival of nationality. A foreign system cramped 
the mind, and translations from the French masters 
lost the delicacy and splendor which they possess in 
their o^vn idiom. The nation as a political body had 
ceased to have a common feeling; in the quarrels of 
Europe, the states of Germany were ranged on different 
sides ; civil wars were not objects of horror; a com¬ 
munity of political feeling did not exist even in theory. 
Skepticism had counteracted the former energy of the 
rehgious principle. The princes and German courts 
were all French in taste and manners; and though 
many were lavish of their means in gaining new lux¬ 
uries and increasing their splendor, yet it never occurred 
to them to gather round their baby thrones the best 
spirits of their nation, and so to embalm their own 


128 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


memories in a permanent literature. Thus letters had 
nothing to hope from the government, the nobility, 
or the opulent; and could find inspiration neither in 
national taste, nor in the religious feeling of the age, 
nor in patriotism. 

Of the leading sovereignties in Germany, not one 
was administered in a national spirit. Motives of local 
policy and relative aggrandizement swayed the cabinets. 
The imperial constitution had become a frail bond of 
union for elements, which had at no period been well 
consolidated, and which were now forcibly repelling 
each other; tottering towards its end, it resembled a 
decrepit old man, whose gray hairs may gain a respect 
which his strength cannot command. The influence 
of Prussia at the diet made the imperial crown still 
more an empty pageant. The political alliance of 
Austria with the Prench, though it ended in disasters 
to the latter, was unfavorable to patriotism; while 
Frederic, who had to contend with a German army 
against the Bourbons for his existence, trampled on 
the nationality of his subjects, gathered round his 
person the writers of France, and contemplated the 
literary occupations of his own countrymen with super¬ 
cilious indifference or contempt. Circumstances hke 
these weighed down the spirit of native writers. A gen¬ 
eral languor characterised style, which had nothing of 
natural passion, or even of uncouth energy. The noble 
dialect of Germany was used without strength, dignity 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


129 


or grace, while the practice of reciprocal indiscriminate 
praise, that pestilent patron of mediocrity in either hem¬ 
isphere, lavished honors, as if genius had been of 
every-day growth. 

Light began to dawn when public discussion be¬ 
came more free; and a Saxon and a Swiss school were 
formed, at first in rivalry, and finally in declared hos¬ 
tility. Of the former, Gottsched was the leader, at 
Leipzig; while Bodmer, at Zurich, with Breitinger for 
his squire, challenged his adversaries to battle. A 
thirty years’ war preceded the estabhshment of the civil 
and religious liberties of Germany; a thirty years’ 
literary feud between two men of narrow minds and 
boundless vanity, went before its literary awakening. 

Of the belligerent parties, Bodmer made the attack, 
and for several years Gottsched acted on the defensive. 
The Swiss called in the English to his assistance; the 
Saxon took the Erench for auxiliaries. Bodmer deemed 
himself sure of victory and unhmited glory, when he 
brought forward a translation of Milton’s Paradise 
Lost; and we venerate the man who could summon 
Milton as his ally; but Gottsched damned the trans¬ 
lation with faint praise, and having, as Professor of 
Eloquence and Poetry in the University of Leipzig, 
fonned a literary circle in which he was the dictator, he 
issued a decree for translations from the Erench, and 
comedies, and tragedies, in Alexandrines. The rules 
of criticism having been established, poems were \vrit- 
9 


130 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


ten, as if to illustrate a principle. 'Fame, the bright 
guerdon,” is distributed by favor. Many a man has 
suffered martyrdom for his faith; but John Rogers 
alone found his way into the Primer. To Bodmer 
and Gottsched, circumstances secure a conspicuous 
place in the history of letters. 

Bodmer, born 1698, was of narrow intellect and 
limited taste. His mind was fitted out with some 
knowledge of English literature. Of the genius of 
Shakspeare, he had, indeed, no conception; but he 
was firm in the love of Milton. He detested music; 
and rhyme was a greater ofience to him than wine to a 
faithful Mussulman. HimseK destitute of humor and 
of wit, he questioned their value. He held the poetic 
diction of Homer inferior to his own; and would have 
thought himself slighted, had his tragedies been called 
only equal to those of ^schylus and Sophocles; though 
his imagination was as dry as the leaves of last year. 
At first he was a translator and critic, and tried to 
compete with his Leipzig rival; but when almost fifty 
years old, he was smit with the desire of becoming an 
epic poet, and chose Noah for his theme. Something 
he contrived to borrow from Milton and others; but 
he who could not write prose agreeably, attains the 
maximum of ridiculousness in his catalogue of the 
beasts, whose well-arranged columns he marches into 
the Ark in hobbling hexameters. 

Bodmer has the merit of having revived some 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


131 


earlier German works, that were falling into oblivion. 
His adversary, Gottsched, born two years after him, was 
a German at heart, and his love of country is the best 
thing about him. This led him to cherish his own lan¬ 
guage, and to plead for its purity. His poetry is made 
up of common-places, which he could pour out hke 
water; and he was as indefatigable as a mill-stream, 
that runs even on holidays. In Leipzig his authority 
became supreme; and elsewhere, his tragedies were 
acted with applause. His Cato, a tame imitation of 
Addison’s, passed through ten editions. He rebuked 
all levity of manner; abominated operas; did his utmost 
to banish Harlequin from the stage; and passed judg¬ 
ment on Shakspeare as a complete barbarian. When 
he was attacked, his self-complacent pedantry was a 
shield, that the keenest weapons of his foes could not 
pierce. 

His wife surpassed him in talent. The daughter 
of an eminent physician, she had, in her childhood, 
been employed to copy for her father. In her seven¬ 
teenth year, Gottsched became acquainted with her, 
and offered her all the love of which he was capable. 
Their courtship lasted for five years; and their mar¬ 
riage was a barren one, so that she had none of the 
consolations of her sex. She was his assistant rather 
than his wife; their union was but a literary partner¬ 
ship. He made her read Greek and Latin authors of the 
most heterogeneous character, and in the original Ian- 


132 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


guages; concealed behind a partition of tapestry, she 
was compelled to listen, as he screamed out his lec¬ 
tures, and to take notes of them; she carried on 
his correspondence with public men and scholars; she 
daily translated for the press; she wrote for him tra¬ 
gedies and comedies, reviews and prefaces; in the divi¬ 
sion of labor, he composed the elaborate treatises, and 
she defended her husband from ridicule in epigrams. 
She had, moreover, to write the titles of books on the 
backs of some thousands of volumes in the professor’s 
library. All that she accomplished under such aus¬ 
pices, is of little value. More feeling and nature are 
expressed in her private letter to a female friend, to 
whom, about three months before her death, she 
writes:—‘‘ I have sad news to tell you; I am losing 
my eyesight almost entirely. Oh, how I long to hear 
the hour of my dissolution strike. Do you ask for the 
cause of my sickness? Here it is. Twenty-eight 
years of unbroken labor, secret sorrow, and tears 
without number, which God only has seen flow.” 

Of one man, who, at this early period strove for 
the honors of verse, we must speak with veneration. 
Albert Haller, a native of Berne, a pupil of Boerhaave, 
the most eminent physiologist of his day, not only ap¬ 
plied himself to almost every department of learning, 
but in his youth wrote pastorals, and an epic of some 
thousands of lines. These he threw into the flames 
in his twentieth year. His poem of the Alps was 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


133 


composed by him while yet a minor. As a phy¬ 
sician in Berne, he was not very successful; but Mi'inch- 
hausen, the father of the Georgia Augusta, invited 
him to Gottingen. There he awakened a public inter¬ 
est in the youthful university, and established and per¬ 
fected the collections requisite for a high school of 
learning. After he had been professor seventeen years, 
he longed for his own country again, the canton, which 
is filled with the brightest and boldest scenes that 
Europe can show; where brooks, that come from dis¬ 
solving snows, leap doAvn precipices of so many hun¬ 
dred feet, that they are dissipated into spray as they 
fall; where flowers grow by the side of masses of ice, 
and the mountains produce the plants of coldest re¬ 
gions just above the ripening grape : he longed for his 
native city, where one man in four attains the age of 
seventy; where the eye embraces from the hills, in one 
view, the brightest glories of the crowded Alps; and, 
looking beyond the fertile fields of the immediate 
vicinity, beholds in the distance the glaciers, as they 
sparkle in the sunbeams. In Gottingen, he had every 
wish for the advancement of his science gratified; but 
then he was in the midst of the ambitious and conten¬ 
tious, whose clashing interests did not fail to breed 
dislikes; and so his mountain land won him again to 
independence. Being still in the best years of man¬ 
hood, on his return to Berne, he gave himself up in 
part to study, and in part to his countrymen. To the 


134 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


learned periodical, issued at Gottingen, he continued 
to contribute, till finally the number of his articles in 
that work amounted to twelve thousand. In practical 
life, he was always honored with the magistracy; he 
devised a plan for an orphan-house; he reformed the 
medical police; he took care that the poor should have 
good salt to their bread; he settled dissensions about 
boundaries between the cantons ; and all the while 
continued to advance natural science by his labors, 
and conducted a wide correspondence in the pol¬ 
ished dialects of Europe. Meantime, the Univer¬ 
sities of Halle and of Gottingen solicited him to be 
their chancellor; the learned societies of Europe vied 
in electing him their associate; the Russian govern¬ 
ment desired to win him for St. Petersburgh; the 
King of Sweden decorated him with the order of the 
Polar Star; and Joseph II. sought him out in his re¬ 
tirement. But Haller was, in the common sense, 
neither ambitious nor happy. His spirit -never knew 
the joyousness of content. In his seventieth year, 
he escaped from the sorrows of a melancholy temper¬ 
ament and a sickly frame; having, a twelvemonth before 
his death, published the eleventh edition of his poems. 

The praise of Haller extends as far as the science 
which he advanced. In his poems he writes from his 
own warm feelings; and his earnestness communicates 
to his verse an air of solemnity. His style is not 
uniformly correct; and his manner seldom has freedom 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


135 


and ease. His “ Alps had no model in the hterature 
of his language; the descriptions are just, but some¬ 
times too minute and trivial; noble reflections are in¬ 
terspersed amidst description. 

III. 

A greater and a better impulse was given to the 
national mind by Klopstock, who, having remained the 
usual season at the celebrated school of Schul- 
pforte, and then pursued his studies as a theologian at 
Jena, and afterwards at Leipzig, published, while yet in 
his twenty-fourth year, the first three cantos of a poem 
which will never be forgotten. At once a new pros¬ 
pect seemed opening for German letters. In 1748, 
the poet, though still at an early age, covered with the 
glory of unbounded success, went as a teacher in a 
private family to Langensalza; where he became deeply 
enamored of one who did not return his affection. 
The nation heard with astonishment, that there lived 
the German maid that could be indifferent to the suit 
of the bard of the Messiah, to whom the laurel had 
been decreed by acclamation. Letters were sent from 
remote parts, conjming her to yield her heart, and be¬ 
come the inspiring muse of her lover. All in vain; 
and Klopstock, who was deeply chagrined, in the 
days of his dignity remembered his unrequited passion 
as a sinful weakness. His fancy lost something of its 


136 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


delicacy, and his manner assumed more of stateliness. 
Prom that time he appears officially as the ambassador 
of the muses, the representative of morality, and the 
example for the nation. 

The summer of 1750 he passed in Switzerland, on 
Bodmer’s invitation, and universal veneration wel¬ 
comed him to Zurich; but the favor of the king of 
Denmark called him to Copenhagen, where he resided 
for twenty years; in 1771 he established himself in the 
republic of Hamburgh. Age could not chill his love 
of liberty. With a zeal like that of youth he partici¬ 
pated in the enthusiasm excited by the Drench Revolu¬ 
tion, before it soiled itself with blood. He died in 
1803 ; and his funeral was celebrated with a magnifi¬ 
cence never before vouchsafed to a poet’s obsequies. 
It took place on a fine day, in the last of March; 
thousands and thousands thronged to gaze; and every 
honor which could be shown by the citizens and the 
authorities of two opulent mercantile cities, was mani¬ 
fested, as his body was carried from Hamburgh to a 
village near Altona, and buried by the side of his wife. 

Klopstock’s manners were simple; but he had the 
carriage of a pattern-man, as though the whole world 
had an interest in his saying or doing nothing improper. 
Of friendship he made a sort of idolatry; and his sin¬ 
cere heart and warm fancy sometimes invested ordinary 
men with qualities of excellence. His muse never had 
cause to blush for him, either for want of purity, or of 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


137 


honesty; and his life was as spotless as his verse. As 
it regards the great, he was too upright to flatter. 
He had enemies; but he went always his own way, 
and never turned to the right or to the left, to answer 
an adversary. When younger poets began to render his 
supremacy questionable, he neither encouraged nor cen¬ 
sured them. 

Klopstock’s merit for the influence he had on Ger¬ 
man literature, and his general merit for us all, as a 
poet, are very different things. In the first respect, we 
give him the highest place among his countrymen. 
When mediocrity was extolled, he taught the way to 
nobler creations; he reformed the measure of German 
poetry; he led to the abolition of the Alexandrine 
verse, so inconsistent with the genius of his language; 
he introduced into letters, patriotism, with a genuine 
love of religion. 

Klopstock expressed the spirit of romantic poetry 
in classic forms. His measures and his severity of 
taste were ancient; the sentiment and the tone were 
peculiar to the modems. He is the poet of feeling; 
but it is feehng, over which a manly understanding 
keeps guard. His mind never plays with alluring 
forms, that charm the senses; he is uniformly earnest. 
He despised rhyme, though his best hymns are in 
rhyme. He is always national, and full of enthusiasm, 
and yet he is in no respect a bard of the people; we 
mention it not to his praise. He is so refined, that he 


138 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


can be understood only by delicately cultivated minds ; 
he is a mannerist; he aims at presenting what never 
can be described; and he confounds the spirit of epic 
and lyric composition to the injury of his narrative. 
He carried his imitations of Greek and Latin metres to 
pedantry. 

Of the world he knew little; he found his way to 
moral beauty, not through struggles but by his heart. 
His love has not the character of an earthly passion; 
for with him, the place for happy love is heaven; and 
in delineating the joys of affection, he most frequently 
dwells on the sublime hope of recognition in another 
world. His Messiah was not completed till almost thirty 
years from the time when it was commenced. This 
shows it was a work of labor with him. It did not burst 
from a full soul; and is in reality very tedious to read. 

There can be no comparison between Klopstock 
and Milton. Our English poet is immeasurably supe¬ 
rior in all but the expression of visionary and mystic 
feeling. 

Between IQopstock and Dante, the contrast is stiU 
more striking. Klopstock, to enliven his main subject, 
introduces the dead, awakening from the tombs, and 
describes their sensations on recovering life. His con¬ 
versations of this kind are monotonous. In Dante, 
action follows on action; every thing is dramatic; as 
you tread with him on the ashes of the dead, the fires 
blaze up under your feet. After having made such 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


139 


demands on the imagination, to foUow him at all, he 
assumes the exactest standard of accuracy; his sub¬ 
limity is the natural reflection of an observing mind; 
his sentiments flow from the occasion; his language is 
homely, signiflcant, and concise; he is fervent, and yet 
deals in facts. * Klopstock wraps himself up in a cloud, 
and walks forth in shadowy sentimental sublimity. 
Much of his Messiah is characterised by a constant 
effort. He flaps his wings sturdily, but fails to soar. 
He aims at reaching the loftiest heights of sublimity, 
and his feet are still on earth. His writings have not 
the serenity that belongs to divine things. Instead of 
presenting them in their natural simplicity and clear¬ 
ness, he gathers around them a misty glory, and in¬ 
dulges in a sort of intoxication of religious feehng in 
most of his works of a rehgious stamp. Prom tliis 
censure, however, some of his hymns must be except¬ 
ed ; as for instance, the subhme one on Resurrection, 
of which the idea is proclaimed with distinctness, sim¬ 
plicity, confidence, and sublimity. 

In his odes Klopstock gains a beautiful earnestness, 
and an unaffected elevation. Friendship, religion, and 
patriotism, inspired him in these admirable compositions. 
The style is severe, unadorned, and concise, even to 
occasional obscmity; but every word is in its place; 
and the light of conviction breaks out in every line. 
This praise, which we think the highest, belongs to no 
inconsiderable number of the odes, which fill two 


140 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


volumes of his works. They never will be well trans¬ 
lated ; for it would almost be as easy to write them 
anew. 


IV. 

Klopstock regenerated the poetry of Germany; the 
first writer of the eighteenth century, whose manner in 
prose made an epoch, is Gotthold Ephraim Lessing. 
He dethroned the idols that men were worshipping; 
he taught a bolder, more decisive, more profound way 
of criticism, and gave an example of a style, which in 
its kind has not been excelled. 

The son of poor and most religious parents, he 
passed a childhood of self-denial, under a strict system 
of domestic discipline. At an early age he was removed 
to the school of Meissen, and became an excellent 
scholar in the ancient languages and in the mathe¬ 
matics. He went from Meissen to the University of 
Leipzig; where, profiting by the instructions of no pro¬ 
fessor but Ernesti, he fell into company which it 
alarmed his parents to hear that he kept, took a lively 
interest in the theatre, actually wrote for the stage, and 
remained without any fixed pursuit. Weary of Leipzig, 
he removed to Berlin, where he engaged in literary 
labors of minor importance. Erom thence, to please 
his parents, he went to Wittenberg, where he faithfully 
pursued his studies. Having no source of income but 
his literary labors, he next acquired a reputation as 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770. 


141 


a critic, which made him feared in all Germany. Tired 
of Wittenberg, he returned to Berlin, where Mendel¬ 
sohn and Nicolai were his friends, and he produced a 
tragedy on a subject of common life. After an un¬ 
satisfactory engagement as a travelling companion to 
the son of a merchant, he went to Berhn again, and 
supported himself by his writings. For a season, he 
was employed actively in Silesia. From Berhn he was 
induced to go to Hamburgh, as a dramatic critic. 
From thence he was transferred to Wolfenbiittel, 
as Librarian; and he died in the service of Bruns¬ 
wick. 

Lessing was distinguished for a clear understand¬ 
ing, accurate and imniense erudition, and a rapid mind. 
He took nothing on trust; and, least of aU, followed 
the impulse of feeling or of fancy. During his whole 
life, he never had a dream; and a story is told 
of him, that, when a friend, who was travelling with 
him on a fine day in spring, expressed rapture at the 
beauty of the season, he rephed, that he envied the 
sensation which he could not share. He described him¬ 
self to be a critic, not a poet. His words always have 
a plain meaning. Sometimes he throws out his ideas 
in a style that fiows hke a torrent; and sometimes en¬ 
forces them by imagery, always significant, and often 
beautiful. His imagination, which never dazzled, was 
fertile in illustration, so that his style is eminently 
epigrammatic. He had a passionate love for what 


142 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


seemed truth; and, so far from fearing the harsh 
censures of others, he dehghted in opposition. The 
tendency of some of his writings is unquestionably 
skeptical; but his opponents were not without bigotry, 
and no one came forward to cope with him with his 
OAvn weapons. His conflicts were numerous; and no 
man, that ever engaged with him, came off unhurt. 
Dean Swift was not more tremendous in Irish contro¬ 
versies. Indeed, in the most famous of Lessing’s 
battles, he so cut in pieces the leathern shield of 
pedantry and prescription, that his enemies were 
obliged to gag him by an edict from his government. 

If, from a general criticism, we turn to a consider¬ 
ation of the several works of Lessing, we have to con¬ 
sider him as a dramatic writer, a critic, and a writer on 
subjects of philosophy and theology. 

Of his dramas, Minna von Barnhelm appeals to 
national sympathies, having in the background the inci¬ 
dents of the seven years’ war. 

Emilia Galottiy a tragedy in prose, is the flnest of 
its kind, in the German, or in any language. But this 
kind is not the highest. The tale of the Roman Vir- 
ginius is made to wear the mask of modem Italy, so 
that it becomes a protest against the vices of th6 
petty princes, not of that peninsula only, but of Ger¬ 
many. Thus it gains a pohtical interest. In the Ro¬ 
man story, the knife that is drawn, reeking with 
blood, from the wound of Virginia, has a consecrated 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


143 


power, to cut asunder the bonds in which the nation 
was held. Rome’s hberty reconciles us to Virginia’s 
martyrdom. In Emilia Galotti, no revolution breaks 
out, and there is nothing but the moral beauty of 
the sacrifice, to reheve the impression of horror at the 
sad catastrophe. 

Lessing is the most distinguished critic of his 
nation, whether we regard his manner, his originahty, 
or his influence. His greatest work in this depart¬ 
ment is his series of essays on the drama, published 
during the period of his connection with the stage at 
Hamburgh. The French taste was at that time preva¬ 
lent in Germany. Frederic 11. did not attack the 
French armies more boldly than Lessing the French 
dramas; denying the identity of the ancient Grecian 
and the modern French dramatic art. August Schlegel 
has but developed the ideas of the great master. Les¬ 
sing’s error was, that he wished to make the stage too 
natural; thus preparing the way for a flood of tame 
copies of common incidents. But he gave back to 
the Germans their intellectual liberty in matters of 
imagination, especially the drama; he drew the atten¬ 
tion of his countrymen to Calderon and Spanish liter¬ 
ature ; he gave a masterly analysis and defence of the 
critical principles of Aristotle, whose name he declared 
he would not have regarded, had not the reasons of 
the Grecian sage possessed such cogent force; and 
finally, he set in a strong light the genius of Shak- 


144 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


speare, at a time when it was a rare thing, in any 
country, to award the highest honors in the drama 
to the greatest of masters.' 

The theological controversies of Lessing embittered 
his last days. He himself was opposed to all positive 
rehgions institutions. His view was, that rehgious 
truth is eternal, and knows no change; that by de¬ 
grees the hmnan mind has advanced, and is still 
advancing in this, as in every branch of knowledge; 
that a revelation is a truth, communicated to those 
not yet quite ripe to receive it; that it is a step 
towards perfection, to get rid of those prepossessions 
which incline to one form more than another; since 
religion is above them all'—without division and 
without change. 

When Lessing, by the superiority of his own 
talents, was crushing his feeble antagonist, he himself 
was silenced by an effort of despotic authority. Lor 
this, and the abuse he received, he determined to 
‘‘play the theologians a trick,’’ and wrote his last, 
most perfect drama, Nathan the Wise. It is a didactic 
drama, of which the moral is borrowed from a story of 
Boccaccio, whose wealth has fed a hundred beggars. 
The scene is in Jerusalem at the period of the crusades ; 
and the poet introduces the most various personages; 
the chivalrous Saladin, the lord of Mussulmen; the 
wise and wary Nathan, the great leader of the Jews; 
the Christian patriarch; a dervise from the remote 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


145 


East; a Knight Templar; a Christian female slave; 
and a heroine, who was bom a Christian, but had been 
educated in Nathan’s house without any particular re¬ 
ligion. Now, great as is the dramatic interest, the 
philosophical object is the leading one; and that is, to 
represent these several men as going wrong, and doing 
unjustifiable things, whenever they follow their own 
particular faith; and as gaining on our admiration, in 
the degree in which they sacrifice their exclusiveness. 
In so far as a grand lesson of toleration is inculcated, 
and the virtues of humanity, which may bloom on the 
Ganges or in Syria, in Jew or Mussulman, in the Deist 
or the Christian, are concerned, the tendency of the play 
is a noble one. But more is designed; the writer wishes 
not only to show, that generous feehngs may be pro¬ 
duced in any clime, but that aU forms of religion 
counteract those feelings—that the Jew, and the 
Turk, and the Christian, must each throw away the 
peculiarities of his faith, as a dangerous prejudice. 
And under this point of view, Nathan the Wise 
merits the severest reprehension; for there is not 
one particle of the winning graces of Christianity 
in the only Christian characters whom he introduces. 
The female menial is a simpleton, that hardly knows, 
more of her religion than that she has been bap¬ 
tized; the Knight Templar is a splenetic,, disap¬ 
pointed young man; brave, but misanthropical; hon¬ 
est, but rash; and the patriarch is a bloodhomid, who 
10 


146 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


thinks no more of burning a Jew than of whipping a 
thief. 

Lessing’s merits were negative. He was strong to 
pull down, not to build up. He showed the insuffi¬ 
ciency of the rules of criticism prevalent in his country; 
but he left it for his successors to establish a better; 
he unveiled the defects in the works which then en¬ 
joyed popular admiration; but he erected no perfect 
model in any branch of poetic invention, and his 
theory of the drama is a perverse one; he waged war 
on bigotry and blind faith, but he did not leave reli¬ 
gion on a firmer foundation. In short, he attacked ad¬ 
mirably ; he opposed triumphantly; but he has added 
httle to the sum of human happiness and intelligence. 


V. 

The contemporary and coadjutor of Lessing and 
Klopstock in revolutionizing German taste, was Wie- 
land, whose career is psychologically curious. He 
began as a religious enthusiast, and afterwards 
paraded the pretensions of a free-thinker; he was 
in youth prudish, and in his ideas of love eminently 
Platonic; and bye and bye he thought it manly to be 
able to teU a coarse story without blushing. 

In this second period, he drew his system of phi¬ 
losophy partly from Shaftesbury, partly from Helvetius, 
commending virtue, as a sort of heroism, not to be 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


147 


expected from every body, but to be admired when 
it appeared; and esteeming morality, because it is 
graceful and becoming. Having been a visionary", 
he turned satirist; and having himself paraded re¬ 
ligious sentiment like Bodmer, he mocked at enthu¬ 
siasm and ridiculed his master. But as plants cannot 
thrive without the pure air of heaven, so true poetr}" 
cannot put forth its glory without the “ breath of God 
in the soul of man.’’ We venerate the erudition of 
Wieland, but in respect to the moral of his 'svritings, he 
seems to us like a snail, creeping over the best things 
in life, and leaving them odious by the slime which 
marks his progress. The agony of doubt in minds of 
real energy deserves forbearance; but quiet skepticism 
is a result of intellectual indolence, or weakness; and 
contempt falls on those who make a base ‘‘ abandon¬ 
ment of reason ” in Epicurean employments. Wieland’s 
life was regular, but speculatively he yielded himself up 
to the influence of his animal nature, and then rattling 
his chains, pretended to think their clanking was me¬ 
lody, and poetry, and msdom. 

An agreeable style in narration, a pleasant cheer¬ 
fulness of mind, a great extent and variety of acquisi¬ 
tions, a literary industry which kept him on the theatre 
of action full sixty years, are claims to praise which we 
readily acknowledge belong to Wieland. He writes 
gracefully, but without vigor; his style is diffuse, so 
that good-natured critics greeted his birthday with 


148 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


the wish, that the thread of his hfe might be spun out 
as long as his ideas in his own periods; his subjects 
have no real variety; his manner of treating them is 
devoid of nobleness and dignity. A young man in 
conflict with the temptations of life, is his perpetual 
theme, repeated with wearisome prolixity. We have 
it in his novels and in his poems; in the worst and in 
the best; it is the turning point in Oberon, the foun¬ 
dation of Agathon, and, in short, the main staple of 
Wieland’s productions. It is his philosophy, his 
poetry, his prose, his incident, his catastrophe. 

We cannot much admire even the epic poem of . 
Oberon. The narration is easy and agreeable, clear, 
and generally interesting. The plots are closely con¬ 
nected, and the story conducted to a perfect end. But 
the best things in it are borrowed. Besides, our 
author selects for his highest effort, the scene in which 
the unmarried heroine gives birth to a child; and, after 
making all possible allowances for nature, and heathen¬ 
ism, and chivaby, and youth, the accident which brings 
about the trials of the hero and heroine, cannot, by any 
machinery of fairies, be dignified into a poetic incident. 

Agathon, the most famous prose work of Wieland, 
is Tom Jones turned philosopher. The story is in¬ 
vested with an Attic mask, and the arts of erudition are 
called in to give a lustre to the romance. We have the 
system of Plato, assailed by Hippias in person; the 
commonwealth of Athens alternates with Syracuse; 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


149 


and Dionysius, and Dion, and Aristippus, and last of 
all, the excellent Archytas of Tarentum, are conjured 
up by the learning of the novelist. But we are not 
taken into the secret abodes and private mansions of 
Grecian life. It is only modem coquetry that puts on 
an Attic name. Por ourselves, we think we perceive a 
want of individuality, and a wonderful family likeness 
in the heathens and Christians, the infidels and heretics, 
the ancients and moderns, who have been described by 
Wieland; and we should tmst his delineations of life 
at Smyrna, or Syracuse, or Athens, as much as at the 
court of Charlemagne, or any where else, except in the 
coteries of his contemporaries. 

The mind of Wieland was passive, not creative. 
He did not gain his stock from communing with his 
own soul, or with nature, or with God; but he picked 
it up by piecemeal; bringing into his own garner an 
idea from Plato, and a theory from the French mate¬ 
rialists ; a satirical touch from Cervantes, and yet 
more from Lucian; stealing an incident from Fielding, 
a grace from Ariosto, and a story from Chaucer. He 
obtained his inspiration, not by devout prayer to that 
eternal Spirit, who can enrich with all utterance, but by 
the invocation of memory and her siren daughters.'’ 
Klopstock thought meanly of him; and Schiller’s Al¬ 
manac did justice to his general acquaintance mth 
literature, but called him the graceful girl of Wei¬ 
mar, insipid and vain.” 


150 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


Wieland and Klopstock are of opposite polarities; 
those whom the one attracts, the other as surely repels. 
Wieland treats of actual life, Klopstock of sentiment; 
Klopstock is heavenly-minded, Wieland is earthly to 
excess; Klopstock is elegiac, Wieland is gay; Klop¬ 
stock excels in lyric verse, Wieland in narrative; the 
former despised rhyme, the latter delighted in it; 
Klopstock is an eagle soaring away from the crowd, 
Wieland a starling that insults the passers by. 

Of the three most distinguished writers, in the first 
period of reviving literature in Germany, each filled a 
large and important part; the one, by exciting a na¬ 
tional spirit; another, by exercising the severity of 
criticism; and the third, by keeping in favor the blan¬ 
dishments of rhyme in narrative poetry. Thus they 
divided among themselves the labor of restoring letters 
in their country, while throngs of inferior writers 
gathered in groups round the admired triumvirate. 


VI. 

But there was one, who pursued his solitary career 
apart from the crowd. The name of Winckelman is 
not to be pronounced without veneration for his ear¬ 
nestness, and sympathy for his sorrows. The whole 
circle of human knowledge does not possess a more 
cheerful subject of study than that of ancient art, to 
which he devoted himself; and we know not the man 


ITS PROGRESS TILL 1770 . 


151 


of superior mind, whose life has been less favored by 
the ordinary gifts of fortune. He was the son of a 
poor shoemaker, in a town of httle note. At the 
public school, the aged master was pleased with him, 
and took him into his house; and when the old man 
grew blind, the boy used to be his guide, and to read to 
liim, receiving in return the benefit of his conversation. 
After the hardest struggles with extreme poverty at the 
gymnasium, at the university, and in early life, when 
twenty-nine years old, he obtained a place in the 
employ of the Saxon minister, near Dresden, with a 
salary of fifty-six dollars. And here he was happy; 
for he could make himself familiar with painting 
and sculpture. Wlien his merits were perceived, the 
sovereign of Saxony gave him a pension of one hundred 
and fifty dollars, to continue two years, with leave to 
travel in Italy. There he made, himself friends, and 
resided, chiefly in Rome, for thirteen years. In 1768, 
he was induced to visit Germany. As he saw the 
mountains of the Tyrol, his heart grew heavy; as he 
descended them on the north, he was seized with a real 
home-sickness for Italy. With difficulty he was in¬ 
duced to proceed to Vienna. Here he was well re¬ 
ceived by Kaunitz, who had a taste for the fine arts, 
and kindly noticed by Maria Theresa. It was in April 
that he entered Germany; and early in June, he was 
on his way again to Italy. On the journey, the kind- 
hearted, unsuspecting scholar fell into the company of a 


152 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


pardoned convict, who murdered him at Trieste, in the 
hope of getting possession of his gold medallions. 

Winckelman’s History of Ancient Art, first pub¬ 
lished in 1764, is the common property of cultivated 
nations; original in its design; full of taste, erudition, 
and eloquence. When we consider the nature of the sub¬ 
jects, in treating which he obtained his glory, so unlike 
any thing that lay in his horoscope; or the finished 
style in which his works are written, especially when 
the imperfect state of German hterature, previous to his 
leaving Germany, is remembered, we feel for him an 
unmixed admiration. How energetic a wiU must he 
have possessed, to accomplish what he did, as it were 
in spite of his destiny ! And how much is it to his 
honor, that, though he could find rest only among the 
creations of Southern art, he preserved the pride of a 
German, and laid his laurels at the feet of his country. 

MEN OF SCIENCE AND LEARNING. 


I. 

Enthusiasm in letters manifests itself by devoted¬ 
ness. Singleness of purpose can alone conduct to the 
highest eminence; it may leave the character feebly 
developed in the points that concern the details 
of business and active intercourse; but it will give 
the mind a singular power in the department with 
which it is famihar. Engendered in a fervid spirit by 


MEN OF SCIENCE AND LEARNING. 


153 


a noble object, it grows by exercise into a habit; and 
intellectual life, upheld by a permanent excitement, 
almost entirely independent of fortune and the world, be¬ 
comes its own solace and reward. The constant effort at 
advancement in culture and the discovery of truth, 
gives variety and value to existence. In the eye of the 
world, such studious men may appear to be but poor 
calculators, who sacrifice the main chance to follow 
ideal interests; but, on the other hand, in their theory, 
the man of lower pursuits is a thoughtless spendthrift, 
who, being possessed of nothing but time, squanders it 
wastefuUy, and lays up no treasure in himself. 

We name a planet after a German who began his 
career as a musician in a Hanoverian regiment. He 
possessed that power which can consecrate a life to a 
great design. Too poor to buy a telescope, he had in¬ 
genuity enough to make one; and Providence, as if to 
laugh to scorn the vain distinctions of scientific corpo¬ 
rations, left it to this child of nature to make the most 
striking astronomical discovery of the last century. 

Perhaps it may be thought that fame and wealth are 
the leading passions which have impelled men to 
earnest and undivided application. Certainly the love 
of fame becomes a generous mind; for who would not 
wish to stand well with his fellow-men? Yet Her- 
schel’s great precursor, Copernicus, was superior to its 
allurements. He deliberately spent the greatest part 
of a hfe of more than seventy years, in establishing the 


154 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


theory which bears his name; and possessing a kind of 
knowledge which could not but secure to him a univer¬ 
sality of reputation beyond any which a poet can 
compass, he yet communed with himself on his great 
discoveries so long, that he never saw them pubhshed 
till the very day of his death. 

Or is the prospect of wealth the excitement to 
intellectual efforts ? In the same department of 
knowledge, the industry and labors of Kepler were 
unwearied. While others have gained glory by bring¬ 
ing forward isolated doctrines, Kepler created science. 
He had taste and genius for poetry, but gave his en¬ 
thusiasm to the study of the skies. Though in the 
service of the German emperor, he yet lived on the 
narrowest means ; and, after all his success and all his 
labors, left to his family but twenty-two rix dollars, and 
an old horse, worth a few florins. But was Kepler 
therefore unhappy ? His correspondence breathes the 
spirit of cheerfulness, and he tells the story of his own 
penury without complaints. Kepler was the precursor 
of Newton; the Englishman lived to be more than 
eighty; Kepler died while not yet sixty. We do not 
contrast their respective merits; but when it is done, 
the miserable external existence of Kepler should not 
be left out of mind. Newton was worshipped in his 
lifetime as a superhuman being. He was member of 
parliament; was knighted ; enjoyed the benefits of for¬ 
tune ; and, dying, left a good estate. Kepler’s body 


MEN OF SCIENCE AND LEARNING. 


155 


was given to the earth without honor; the remains of 
Newton were interred with pomp, dukes and lords 
being the pall-bearers; on his monument, he was 
called “ the honor of the human race.” In the last 
century, a proposal was made to erect a monument to 
Kepler by subscription, and the plan failed. “ After 
all,” said Kastner, “since Germany refused him 
bread while he dwelt on earth, it matters little now 
that he has been immortal for more than a century 
and a half, whether it gives him a stone.” “ His mon¬ 
ument,” said another, “is in the moon.” 

This devotedness is more frequently illustrated 
among the Germans than elsewhere in Europe. It 
is the same spirit under a different form, that supported 
the man, who, more than any other, is the fit represen¬ 
tative of German character—the father of the reforma¬ 
tion. When he perilled his life without fear, before the 
imperial diet, under the frown of the emperor himself, 
he would not swerve from his purpose, declaring for 
his only excuse, “ I cannot act otherwise, that God 
knows.” 

The exact sciences have continued to be success¬ 
fully cultivated in the country which gave the first 
impulse to modern astronomy. Euler continued his 
labors with cheerfulness, even in the last seventeen 
years of his life, though the light of heaven shone on 
him in vain and his eyes were closed on the splendors 
of the firmament, through which he had loved to trace 


156 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


the wanderings of the planets. In our day the greatest 
of mathematicians in Germany is Gauss. Nothing 
that he has attempted, is left incomplete. In science, 
like Schiller in poetry, he always finished his work 
with the most scrupulous exactness and elegance, not 
so much to delight others, as to satisfy himself. He 
has written little; but the highest perfection belongs 
to all that he has published. Those who are best com¬ 
petent to judge, consider him as the rival of La Place. 
In variety of powers, the Prench astronomer has the 
ascendency; in devotedness, he is surpassed by the 
Hanoverian. La Place had the vanity to be a peer; 
one may see his portrait in Paris, in which he is repre¬ 
sented in the robes of the privileged order. But who 
feels an interest in the Marquis de La Place ? Por the 
farmer’s son, who expounded the system of celestial 
mechanics and discovered new applications of the doc¬ 
trine of the calculus, who reconciled the apparent irreg¬ 
ularities in the motions of the heavenly bodies with the 
infiuence of acknowledged laws, and deduced directly 
from the principle of gravity the results which had 
been gathered from the observations of many cen¬ 
turies—for him, one of the greatest mathematicians of 
all times, we have the most profound respect. But La 
Place, the unskilful minister of the interior, the chan¬ 
cellor of Napoleon’s senate, the member of the upper 
house of the Bourbons, was, after all, but an infe¬ 


rior man. 


MEN OF SCIENCE AND LEARNING. 


157 


II. 

May we not then infer, that the power of con¬ 
secrating a life with undivided zeal to one great object, 
is characteristic of Germany ? In the department of 
natural history, this quality leads to wonderful accuracy 
and minuteness of knowledge. We might refer to the 
cabinet in Berlin, as perhaps the best arranged of any 
in the world. Not to enumerate many names, we yet 
must express veneration for the patriarch Blumenbach, 
who for more than fifty years taught the great 
branches of natural history and physiology to crowded 
audiences. The spirit that breathed in all that he 
uttered, enkindled the ardor of curiosity. Versed in all 
that could interest a philosopher, he strayed into other 
departments of science only to illustrate his own. 

His great contemporary in Paris, the Baron Cuvier, 
took office under the Bourbons, and, without one single 
talent as a statesman, except the gift of speaking grace¬ 
fully and fluently, was yet tickled with the cap and 
bells of public place. Blumenbach, too, had been at 
court; but not as a possessor of office. On a journey 
to England, George the Third, who loved his Hanove¬ 
rian subjects, invited him to Windsor. ‘‘Now tell 
me,” said the king familiarly, “of all that you have 
seen in my capital what has most surprised you?” 
“ The Kangaroo,” replied Blumenbach promptly; for 
that singular animal had then for the first time been 
brought from Australasia. 


158 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


The pupils of Blumenbach cherish towards him re¬ 
spect and affection; and long after the echo of his voice 
shall have died away, they will remember the hours 
that were passed in his lecture-room as among the 
most profitable and agreeable of their lives. Is it asked 
by what secret charm he so long gathered around him 
from all parts of the world a throng of curious youth, 
whose affection he governed, and whose zeal he in¬ 
flamed ? It was genius united with singleness of pur¬ 
pose and cheerful benevolence. At ease in his oto 
mind, he observed all earnest efforts with dehght, and 
derived information from every possible source; and 
while his powers are of a nature which would con¬ 
duct to eminence in any career, he never faltered in his 
attachment to the science which won his first love. 

In the same way the secret of German success in 
philological pursuits lies in the unity of object, encou¬ 
raged and strengthened by free and numerous competi¬ 
tion. In England men of learning often acquire high 
offices in the church. But Heyne, once immersed in phi¬ 
lological lore, was never to quit it except with life. 
Eighteen years did not seem too many to give to the 
elucidation of one poet. That poet was indeed 
Homer, and the interpretation of his rhapsodies 
brought into discussion the whole of Grecian my¬ 
thology. Heyne acquired, on the score of per¬ 
sonal character and capacity for business, a great and 
well-founded fame. He was the confidential friend 


MEN OF SCIENCE AND LEARNING. 


159 


of a prime minister, yet his influence was used solely to 
perfect the establishments of the university of which he 
was a member. In a letter from him to Herder, he 
describes his mode of life. “ I see company,’’ says he, 
“ hardly three times a year,” and he declares that “ all 
his colleagues, except the fools,” thus live within them¬ 
selves. He was accustomed to rise at five, and was so 
closely employed during the morning, that he did not 
see his family till the time for dinner. This was a 
hasty meal. At tea, he spent with them a quarter of 
an hour, and that only in his advanced age. At eight 
came the evening repast, to which he willingly gave an 
hour, and then he continued his employments till half¬ 
past ten or eleven. In this way he was able to read 
three or four lectures of an hour’s length daily, to 
despatch more than a thousand letters a year, to publish 
elaborate works, of which the titles cover twenty octavo 
pages, and to write at least eight thousand articles in 
the Review of which he was the editor, beside many 
contributions to other journals. Such a career is 
hardly enviable; and he may seem to have renounced 
all the comforts of social life. Yet Heyne was beloved 
in his family, and tenderly respected by his children. 
His external circumstances were, for a part of his life, 
severe in the extreme. But at last he found a refuge. 
Having acquired by his wisdom the direction of the 
most respected university of the continent, he beheld 
all its institutions thrive under his management; his 


160 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


name spread through the world; even in his lifetime 
the greatest of the Roman poets was introduced into 
the United States in the text which his industry had 
amended. The merit of Heyne extended to a reform 
in learning. The necessity of grammatical precision 
continued to be acknowledged, but taste also was culti¬ 
vated, together with a lively sensibility to all the beauty 
and instruction contained in the written monuments of 
antiquity. It was in his school, and following in his 
steps, that the seed was sown for the rich harvest 
which is now gathering in Germany in every branch 
of philological research. 

One pecuhar merit of Heyne we cannot forbear 
mentioning. He was the librarian of the Georgia 
Augusta, and an excellent one; and to us this seems 
high praise. There are probably at this time not more 
than six good librarians in the world, and of these we, in 
this country, at least have one. The office requires de¬ 
votedness ; and further, a good librarian must be conver¬ 
sant with all the sciences, must possess the very spirit of 
order, great activity and vigilance, and an almost intui¬ 
tive judgment, to make new purchases with prudence, 
and preserve a proportion in the several departments. 
Heyne, though he began under no peculiarly favorable 
auspices, was chief librarian for forty-nine years, with 
almost unlimited influence; and he left the collection, 
the very best, decidedly the best arranged, and the 
most judiciously put together, in Europe. The royal 


MEN OF SCIENCE AND LEARNING. 


161 


library at Paris is a chaos to it. In a collection of 
about 300,000 volumes, there is not one on which even 
a younger clerk cannot readily lay his hand. 


III. 

No one has contemplated classical antiquity from a 
more commanding point of view than Frederic Augustus 
Wolf, the illustrious rival of Heyne. This most celebra¬ 
ted scholar of our times, was bom of humble parents in 
17 5 7, at Hainrode, in the county of Hohenstein. Hardly 
was he seven years old, before he was entered at the 
Gymnasium in Nordhausen; and at seventeen, he re¬ 
paired to the University of Gottingen, with the reputa¬ 
tion of having already acquired an extraordinary ac¬ 
quaintance with the works of the ancients. His favorite 
study led him at once to Heyne, who questioned him 
on his plans. When he declared his intention of devo¬ 
ting himself to classical philology, Heyne, who in his 
early years had suffered from extreme want and 
defeiTed expectation, endeavored to dissuade him, 
saying, “There are but three professorships of Elo¬ 
quence in all Germany.” “ One of those three 1 am 
determined to have,” rephed the young aspirant; and, 
in fact, in 1783, before he was twenty-seven, he be¬ 
came professor of Eloquence in tlie University of 
Halle, where he pursued his high literary career with 
1 ] 


162 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


boldness, ardor, and, we believe, with prodigious, 
though irregular industry. 

In after life, he used to say of himself, that it was 
his object to be an instructor, not an author. And it 
is the testimony of one of his pupils, that at times it 
was with difficulty he could make his way through the 
crowd in his lecture-room. His hearers, it was said, 
“ hung upon his hps with such attention and love, that 
you might have heard their hearts beat under their 
shaggy coats.” On the other hand he was excessively 
overbearing toward his colleagues; excusing himself in 
the words of Bentley, with whom he dehghted in being 
compared; and who would take off his hat only to the 
junior students, saying, “ Of the former nothing can 
be made; the latter may yet come to something.” 
But with all the excesses of his occasional arrogance. 
Wolf's disposition was benevolent. His time he gave 
most hberaUy to his pupils. He lent books from his 
very valuable hbrary cheerfully ; and when these have 
been sold by some ungrateful vagabond, he has repur¬ 
chased his own volumes without losing his temper, and 
without becoming less liberal in his spirit. He used 
to say, that there was a malice of the head, and a 
mahce of the heart. Of the last he declared he pos¬ 
sessed nothing. 

When Halle was annexed to the kingdom of West¬ 
phalia, Wolf was transferred to Berlin; and though 
he did not take an active part in the new imiversity. 


MEN OF SCIENCE AND LEARNING. 


163 


which was then establishing in that city, he still pro¬ 
fessed to read lectures. But here was the trial of his 
character. The use which a man makes of his leisure, 
shows the spirit he is of; and if prosperity is in gen¬ 
eral the great trial of character, it is the opportunity to 
be indolent which is the touchstone of the scholar. 
Wolf, when he fomid himself possessed of leisure and 
a pension, became idle; and he who as a philologian 
would have had no peer in Europe, set up for a fine 
gentleman. But with all his efforts, the man, who had 
spent his youth among the mountains, and his man¬ 
hood among books, never could get the air of a 
courtier. 

The stranger that would see him, might expect to 
find him on a sunny morning in the park between 
eleven and one, or at the best restaurateur s about 
three, or an hour or two later at his own rooms. 
If joined on his walks, and he preferred society, he 
would, with delightful garrulity, tell the story of his 
early life, repeat his good sayings, especially his severe 
ones, fight his battles mth his assailants over again, 
and boast that his five letters to Heyne were as sym¬ 
metrical as a Greek tragedy. He would recount the 
persons of rank, by whom he had been treated with 
civility; and now and then he would speak of the 
poetry he admired, and the examples of ancient or of 
modem wortli to which he offered a wiUing tribute. 
For he retained to the last something of the lofty spirit 


164 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


of a scholar; if he loved good cheer, he loved a good 
book also; the exquisite airs in the last opera of Ros¬ 
sini, or the admirable acting on the Berlin stage, never 
made him faithless to the strains in the Greek cho¬ 
ruses, which he would pretend that he could read as 
easily as the prayer-book. He studied the art of living 
well; but he also retained a soul for the unrivalled 
eloquence of Plato. If in his desultory conversation he 
sometimes repeated the newest tale of scandal, he 
would at others with his clear voice, which was melody 
itself, read aloud the perfect hexameters of Homer, or 
run through the mazes of a Pindaric strophe, or chant 
the rapid anapaests of his favorite Aristophanes. He 
prided himself also on his knowledge of the English; 
and Fielding’s Tom Jones was his favorite work. His 
pronunciation of the French was not good, yet he held 
himself perfectly competent to judge of the delicacies 
and rules of that language. 

He could not brook a superior in any thing. To 
show his own mastery over the German, he began a 
strictly literal version of the Odyssey, adding nothing, 
exhausting the meaning of each Greek word, and 
giving not merely line for line, but foot for foot, and 
caesura for caesura. When he had completed exactly 
one hundred lines in this manner, he stopped in the 
midst of a sentence, declaring that there lived not the 
man who could go on and finish the period. Again, 
when he wrote in German, he, more than once, made 


MEN OF SCIENCE AND LEARNING. 


165 


an apology for employing a language that was less 
familiar to him than Latin. Of his style in Latin, no 
praise could seem to him excessive. Cicero had, in 
one of his works, translated a long passage from 
the Euthyphron of Plato; Wolf turned the whole 
of the dialogue into Latin in a most masterly man¬ 
ner, and on purpose, as he has been heard to say, 
that he might challenge a comparison with Cicero 
himself. 


IV. 

Wolf was accustomed to complain, that the study 
of theology was made a profession by itself, and 
Grotius was his example, to prove the compatibility 
of theological erudition with the acquisitions of a 
statesman. 

German theology, however, is a topic on which it 
is not our province to enter. Its learning is univer¬ 
sally acknowledged; but objections are raised to its 
faith and spirit. We venture to suggest that Chris¬ 
tianity has nothing to fear from investigation; that 
Germany is the centre and main support of protestant- 
ism on the continent; that to declare its most learned 
divines no better than infidels, has at least nothing of 
consolation in it; and finally, that the German nation, 
as a mass, is eminently quickened and cheered by re¬ 
ligious infiuences. We will add one word more, for 
to defend a tolerant spirit is never out of season. The 


166 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


Germans in their turn are astonished, when they are 
told that thousands of children walk our streets who 
have not been baptized; and that the great majority 
in our country know nothing of the rite of confirmation. 
Let us then beware of rash judgments respecting a 
great people. The proper consideration of difierences 
in usages and habits of thought may nourish a 
stronger attachment to the principle which underhes » 
ceremony and lends to a custom its importance. 

Nor shall we attempt an analysis of the masters in 
German philosophy. The effect on the nation at 
large of the earnest and continued study of meta¬ 
physics, is as manifest as that of Edwards and Hopkins 
on the intellectual habits of the people of New Eng¬ 
land. So various are the systems, that almost every 
possible theory may be found, either in the lessons of 
Kant, who investigates with exactness the sources of 
science, measures the boundaries of the human un¬ 
derstanding, sets up the landmarks between positive 
knowledge and idle speculation, and then deduces the 
rules of taste, the principles of justice, the doctrines of 
virtue, and the truths of religion, from reason itself, 
and the ultimate laws of human existence; or, in the 
audacious Eichte, who leaves the ideal Berkeley far in 
the rear, annihilates earth and heaven, and exaggerates 
the sentiment of individuality, till he comes to know 
of no essence but himself, and deems the universe and 
its glories but creations and images of his own mind; or 


I 


\ 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 167 

in Schelling, who claims existence for the external 
world, and, after exhibiting it in the splendors of its 
actual being, falls down and worships it, as though it 
were identical with the divinity itself; or in Hegel, 
who dresses up common truths in uncommon forms, 
transposes ontology to logic, and constitutes the laws 
of logic which to him are the laws of being, the minor 
deities of a new rehgion ; or lastly, the pure and gentle 
Jacobi, whose nature abhorred skepticism and specu¬ 
lative abstractions, and received the truths which he 
vindicated, as well as his happy style, from the im¬ 
pulse of his heart. 

THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 

I, 

Of the men of letters in Germany, who in the sec¬ 
ond great period of its literature contributed to elevate 
the reputation and improve the taste of their country. 
Herder was distinguished for variety of attainments, 
industry and purity. 

The son of a poor Prussian schoolmaster, he re¬ 
ceived his hterary education in Konigsburg, at a time 
when the chair of philosophy in that university was 
filled by Kant; and while he devoted himself especially 
to the study of theology, he was deeply interested in 
philosophy and elegant literature, felt the inspiration 
which had been breathed into his country by Klopstock 


168 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


and Lessing, and was desirous of taking part in guiding 
the taste and thoughts of the pubhc. 

While yet in the vigor of early manhood, after 
travelling in his OAvn country and a part of Prance, 
and after having passed five years with the Prince of 
Biickeburg, Herder was invited to accept a professor¬ 
ship in theology at Gottingen. But the reigning king 
of England, George the Third, in the exertion of his 
power as Elector of Hanover and Rector of its Univer¬ 
sity, negatived the appointment, on the ground that his 
religious opinions were not orthodox. The more liber¬ 
al duke of Saxe Weimar placed him at the head of the 
clergy in that Duchy; and by the change of residence. 
Herder became the companion of Goethe, Wieland, 
and Schiller. 

Without possessing great originality, he had that 
power which gives life to acquisitions. Conscious of 
his own inability to tread firmly in the highest “ heaven 
of invention,” he contented himself with occupations 
suited to his capacities, taking the widest range 
through the literature of almost every age and nation. 
He knew how to enter upon the study of a foreign 
work, as if he had been of the country and the time for 
which it was originally designed, and he was able to 
transfer into his own language the lighter graces, no 
less than the severe lessons of foreign poets; the ballads 
of Scotland, and the songs of Sicily; the traditions of 
the Spanish Cid, and the brilliant sayings of the Per- 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 169 


sian Saadi. To turn over some parts of his works is like 
walking in a botanical garden, where the rare and pre¬ 
cious plants of other countries, which thrive in climates 
the most distant and most different, are artificially, yet 
safely collected, and planted without injury in soils 
suited to their natures. 

In 1778 and 1779 he undertook to collect, and 
faithfully transfer to his own language the most beau¬ 
tiful and most popular songs of all nations, and thus by 
comparing the national feehngs of different ages and 
races to exhibit the identity of aU. The noblest bards 
were to be assembled, and each to express the genius of 
the people to which he belonged, so that from the most 
various national tones, the harmony of all with one 
common nature might be apparent. These repre¬ 
sentatives of popular feeling from all parts of the 
world and all periods of history, were to meet together 
and unite in bearing testimony to humanity, the affec¬ 
tions, and moral rectitude. The design was not car¬ 
ried out in its full extent, but its spirit pervades the 
volumes of Herder, some of which may be compared to 
a fanciful piece of mosaic, composed of costly stones 
from all parfe of the world, and if not always arranged 
in the very best taste, at least always rich in them¬ 
selves, and well fitted to instruct. He did more than 
translate. Wherever he found a just and happy image 
or allegory, he would interweave it gracefully into his 
criticisms or essays; or remarks on history and man. 


170 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


Prom the rubbish of verbal commentators and alle¬ 
gorical expositors, he has drawn many curious and in¬ 
structive fables, narratives, proverbs, and comparisons; 
thus putting in currency again many a bright thought, 
which lay covered with the rust of learning. In fables, 
dialogues, and familiar letters, in poems and allegories, 
imitated, translated, or original, he alike endeavored to 
please and to teach lessons of goodness. It may be 
said of Herder, that he passed his life in tranquil indus¬ 
try, possessed of a delicate perception of the beautiful, 
cherishing in himself and others a love of learning, 
creating as it were anew the thoughts of the wise and 
good, disseminating a knowledge of what seemed to 
him the elements of virtue, and cherishing and pro¬ 
moting whatever can improve or adorn humanity. 

In his prose, his thoughts are communicated under 
the most various forms and images; and his style 
would seem gorgeous from excess of ornament, were it 
not that for him a profusion of comparisons and figures 
of rhetoric seems not the efibrt of art, but the most 
natural mode of expression. Pew of his works can be 
recommended as finished performances, or of universal 
interest. His philosophical reflections on the History 
of Man are written in a solemn and contemplative 
mood, and exhibit, perhaps, most fairly his private 
character not less than his merits as a miter. 

There are those who delight in poetry, because it 
crowns enjoyment with the most exquisite gaiety. 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 171 

The muse that guided Herder’s steps, showed him 
the worm that gnaws at the bud of earthly joys, 
tin in bitterness of heart, he railed at the fools who 
put their trust in them. She showed him the traces 
of death in the very haunts of crowded existence, but 
also led him to familiarity with the lessons of immor¬ 
tality, so that qualities apparently the most opposite 
were united in him. He was heavenly-minded and se¬ 
rene in his own love of goodness; but he hated all that 
was opposed to the objects that he cherished. When 
reproof was forced from him, his censure was not 
measured. Dislike became antipathy; and disdaining 
all compromise, he loathed what he did not admire, 
and detested even to injustice what was not in 
harmony with his feelings. In this way his peace was 
disturbed, and his life embittered. He held up the 
torch to the defects and faults of others with an un¬ 
steady hand, and “the dark flame, throwing out 
sparks in every direction, injured himself the worst.” 

Herder possessed vivacity, but not cheerfulness; a 
kind disposition, but not a happy one; great suscep¬ 
tibility, but no content. Being of a glowing temper, 
he carried his elegance of taste into mournful themes. 
He muses on the grave, but covers it with flowers; his 
imaginings are of death, but he bodies forth its angel as 
a beautiful youth, with whom he could even grow 
familiar. He used to long to see a spirit, and was 


172 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


doubtless in earnest in the desire. His imagination 
has been compared to the night-blooming Cereus. 

He was fond of nature, for nature soothes irritable 
men by her permanent loveliness. To his eye the 
meanest floweret opened views into Paradise. But he 
never was calmly contented. Wrong affected him, as 
some lively poisons do the system. He would commit 
acts of indiscretion in defending the side of good feeling 
and truth; and when the serpents of the age turned 
and hissed at him, he kept his ground, in haughty 
defiance, striking passionate blows, without good aim, 
at those against whose venom he took no pains to pro¬ 
tect himself. All his intercourse with man was at¬ 
tended with excitability; and he had little practical 
talent, and no tact in the management of ordinary con¬ 
cerns. He grew to be dissatisfied with the whole age 
in which he lived, not less than with his part in it; 
and one fine morning, as he heard the clear tones of 
the bells of the cathedral, he exclaimed, ‘‘ Would that 
I had been born in the middle ages! ’’ Nay, he was 
dissatisfied with life itself, and at the close of it is re¬ 
ported to have said, ‘‘ Thou Sun, I am weary of thy 
beams! ’’ 

His luxuriant and productive learning hung round 
his melancholy nature like a vine with its delicious 
clusters round a cypress tree. Yet the works of 
Herder are so filled with lessons of benevolence, 
and excellent examples, that they nourish the love 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 173 


of virtuous action, and above all, the respect for 
human nature. The admiration of moral beauty 
was a part of his rehgion; his faith in it lay en¬ 
shrined within him, with the love of God. His mind 
is earnest to gather together the scattered proofs of 
human excellence, to discern, amidst the wrecks of 
genius and the abuse of power, the marks of a better 
nature, to form a beautiful ideal of humanity. The 
most touching testimony to the personal excellence of 
Herder, was given by the celebrated Amelia, dutchess 
dowager of Weimar. On the morning of her own 
death, she observed with serenity, “ Now I shall soon 
be with my dear Herder.” 


II. 

Herder’s friend and admirer, John Paul Richter, 
at home called Jean Paul, was one of the most singular 
and original writers of his age. His works are difficult 
to read; his character and place as an author not easy 
to determine. In the old Spanish plays, the part of 
the buffoon is conspicuous. He has the readiest wit, 
the greatest shrewdness, the happiest invention. Not 
a responsible actor in the drama, he is the coolest spec¬ 
tator, and all the while observes with judgment. He 
sees all that there is that is ludicrous in connexion 
v\dth sublimity; he moralizes often in an elevated 
strain, but his sentimental borders on the burlesque. 


174 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


and his sublimity partakes of rant. Does not the 
world give cause for the existence of such a being ? 
Are not the grandest things which hmnan power can 
produce, found by the side of something inexpress¬ 
ibly mean? In the genuine Harlequin, the keen 
sensibility to sublime emotions, is united to a pow¬ 
erful talent at ridicule; and raillery and irony are 
blended with sincere admiration and eloquence. Of 
this character our English Milton has nothing; Scott 
has not much; Moore a great deal; Byron, except for 
his misanthropy, most of all; especially in his later 
period. |^ow, if we were to express our view of Jean 
Paul’s place in the great drama of letters, we should 
call him the sublime Harlequin. He philosophizes as 
wisely and as morally as Hamlet and the churchyard 
clowns put together; like them he is as likely to sing at 
grave-making as at any time, and would be as ready to 
defend rehgion with a jest as with an argument. He 
is more nearly mad, and not less given to muse, 
than the Prince of Denmark; and poor Yorick could 
not have surpassed him in infinite jest and excellent 
fancy. The first impression produced by almost any 
of his works, will be a bewildering one; but he who is 
once initiated into his manner, will readily acknowledge 
him to be one of the most original and able writers of 
his time. 

Hoffinann followed in the steps of Jean Paul, but 
had neither the deep philosophy, nor the fine moral 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 175 


sense of his master. His was at once the madness of 
the musician, the man of letters, and the hbertine; 
his mind was as free from restraints, as his life from 
rule; and as he had few sympathies with man, he de¬ 
lighted in the terrors and excitements of supernatural 
existences. Striving after terrific interest, he de¬ 
generates into common-places. His enthusiasm is 
foaming and turbulent ; his eloquence is but in 
flashes; and his feverish fondness for unnatural ex¬ 
citement in literary composition, led him to fantastic 
inventions. His life was the life of a spendthrift 
Epicurean, his death the death of a Stoic. Nothing 
that he has written is of such terrific power, as his 
own conduct in the illness which followed his ex¬ 
cesses and terminated his life. It was the criminal 
grinning at the executioner, as the wheel crushed 
him. 

Of Biirger the best ballads are well known to the 
English reader, for Scott has been willing to translate 
them. His private history and character were too 
wretched to admit of scorn, and too pitiful to win re¬ 
spect. His poems were made the subject of a review by 
Schiller, in which the great bard has developed his own 
views of his art, with too much, perhaps, of speculative 
criticism, but with a noble sublimity of feeling. The 
critique condemned Biirger, as deficient in delicacy 
and the conception of ideal beauty,—in every quality 
which constitutes the essence of poetry. It is usual to 


176 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


charge Schiller with an error of judgment, resulting 
from his temporary addiction to Kant’s philosophy. 
But whatever objections may be brought against his 
abstract reasonings, his judgment on Burger’s poetry 
is in no wise too severe. 

The Stolbergs have hardly a claim to be remem¬ 
bered out of their own country; and the good, rural, 
homely, plain-spoken Voss never tasted the stream of 
Helicon, though he was a very learned and very accu¬ 
rate translator and editor. But as a man, he wins our 
esteem for his simplicity and independence. The 
manners and household of Voss were distinguished 
for hospitable frugality. “I thank God,” he would 
say, “for leaving me cheerfulness in my old age.” 
And again: “I have lived a happy life, dividing 
my time between my books and my garden.” He 
even imagined himself to be possessed of philosophic 
tranquillity, though he was the most contentious 
scholar of his day. He was always ready for battle. 
He foamed at the bare name of nobility; at the mere 
mention of feudal knights, he raised a hue and cry 
after the thieves and robbers; and as some men, 
according to Shylock, cannot contain themselves if 
they hear 

“ The bagpipe sing in the nose. 

And some are mad if they behold a cat,” 
so the excellent and ingenuous Voss caught fire at the 
name of a rival or anantagonist. 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 177 


Whoever touched Voss on republicanism, struck 
the key-note. A splendid eulogy of Washington and 
Franklin would follow; but the discourse would proba¬ 
bly terminate in a tirade against the caste of privileged 
birth, of which the chief privilege, he would say, was, 
never to be hanged on the gallows. 

Voss’s hobby-horse was the danger impending over 
the Protestant church. He would tell a long story 
about secret societies for making proselytes to the 
bosom of the Roman Cathohc faith; and rave against 
mystical tendencies; any one who hved on terms of 
amity with a Roman Catholic, was to him already little 
better than a renegade; and he had the most rare 
talent at getting scent of a disguised Jesuit. 

He was a religious man; but his religion partook 
of the sternness of his own character. He pardoned 
nothing to devout weakness, or to superstitious feelings. 
“This life,” said he, “is but the prelude; action is 
happiness here, and without action there can be no 
Heaven.” And then he would get into a passion and 
hotly declare that he could not endure the thought of 
Heaven as a place of absolute rest, or of blessedness, 
where the blessed have nothing to do. But what 
activity could such a man mean ? An English philos¬ 
opher avowed his hope, that his soul after death would 
revisit the scenes of its earthly interests, and hover 
with delight round his laboratory and his chemical 

apparatus; and they say Johann von Muller trusted in 
12 


178 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


the next world to be able to continue making excerpta 
for his universal history. The heroes of Greece be¬ 
lieved they should still, in the realm of spirits, pursue 
each “ his favorite phantom; ” and the Indian hunter 
looks for ampler grounds for the chase, 

“ The hunter and the deer a shade.” 

By the same rule Voss might expect still to declaim 
intolerantly against intolerance, still to oppose bigotry 
with a bigotry yet more obstinate, to scold at rivals, to 
unmask Cathohcs in disguise, to translate good verses 
and write dull ones, and to hve on for ever in the tur¬ 
moils of controversy. He has at last gone to his rest 
with the patriarchs of the infant world,” and now we 
trust he has found, that men of all religious sects, and 
even Jesuits themselves, may reach the world of un¬ 
clouded truth; that mistakes in literary opinions are 
of no more moment than the dust we tread upon; and 
that all errors are terminated and forgiven in the re¬ 
gions of perfect knowledge. 

Of the Schlegels, the successful founders of a criti¬ 
cal school, the extraordinary merit as critics, dis¬ 
played both in contributions to public journals and in 
elaborate works, is cheerfully acknowledged. StiU the 
light of Lessing outshines them far, and not to them, 
but to that great master, belongs the credit of having 
given to the public mind in Germany the impulse 
which has finally extended its influence through the 
world. 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 179 


Of Tieck, an industrious and gifted adherent of 
the critical school of the Schlegels, the brightest poetical 
side is the polemical. Whilst the Schlegels criticised, 
he wrote humorous and ironical dialogues, poems, and 
tales. He contributed essentially to the emancipation 
of literature from pedantic rules, though at the same 
time the tendency of his works, and of those of his 
school generally, has likewise been to produce a feeble 
and affected imitation of natural excellence. 

The fragments of Hardenberg, who wrote under 
the name of Novalis, abound in exaggerated opinions, 
and also in flashes of real sagacity; but a sickly hue 
belongs both to his poetry and his prose. He is like 
Laocoon whom the sculptor represents with the mouth 
open, as if to shriek ; only in the statue, the agony of 
the father excuses the expression of anguish; but sym¬ 
pathy is not willingly extended to the melancholy of a 
young man, mth whom life had not dealt harshly. 
Yet, in a serious hour, the detached thoughts and 
mournful songs of Novahs, will be read with interest. 

• III. 

We do not attempt an enumeration of even those men 
of letters, who within the last fifty years have gained 
success in Germany. That country boasts of more than 
twelve thousand living authors, of whom more than a 
thousand are female. In 1823, a curious observer 
was able to count two hundred and eighty-seven 


180 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


dramatic poets alone. In the sciences, which are carried 
forward by industry and research, no discovery may be 
neglected; but in works of invention, the few great 
masters of a foreign nation alone pass the boundary of 
their native land to become denizens of the world. 

Of these Schiller is one of the greatest. No poet 
ever possessed more of the alFection of his countrymen. 
His fame has been cherished by them with a tender¬ 
ness approaching to a personal attachment. His 
nature was frank, earnest, and virtuous; and com¬ 
manded respect for the man, who sacrificed every 
thing to his art and the culture of his genius. When 
the news of his untimely death was promulgated, men 
mourned, as though each family had lost a favorite in¬ 
mate. His life was one continued struggle. The se¬ 
verest censures ever passed upon his faults, have been 
pronounced by himself; while he strove with unceas¬ 
ing zeal to emancipate himself from every infiuence 
which could prevent his acquiring the highest moral 
and poetic perfection. 

His theory of poetry led him to consider beauty as 
something independent of the passions which it can 
excite; and to be pursued in a sphere, elevated above 
the common sympathies of mankind. The poet was, in 
his mind, a superior being, upon whom the bright sun¬ 
shine of inspiration was the direct efiluence of celestial 
light; he might, indeed, stoop to his feUow-mortals, 
but only to lift them to the elevated regions of purity 


THE AGE OF SCHULER AND GOETHE. 181 


in which he moved. These views were the result of 
patient study; they commended themselves to an acute 
and speculative mind, which, from its own constitution, 
took no part in the ordinary bustle of existence. But, 
when Schiller came to write, he was not restrained by 
cold rules within the icy limits of an austere, or meta¬ 
physical sublimity. In his theory he derided nature, 
and longed to depict the ideal; when he invented, his 
theory gave him dignity, correctness, and a noble firm¬ 
ness of character; but his feelings hurried hun to 
throw himself as a penitent at the feet of nature, 
and she, hke a doting mother, readily forgave him 
his temporary absence, in joy at his return. 

An only child of fond parents, Schiller was, from 
early life, sensitive to every noble quality, and disdain¬ 
ful towards all that is common and mean. His educa¬ 
tion was mihtary, and opposed to his natural tastes, 
which he could nourish only in secret. Entirely cut 
off from the world, confined within a school which was 
governed by mechanism, knowing none but lus fellow- 
students, wholly unaccustomed to female society, he 
ventm’ed to write a play, while yet a minor, and to 
pubhsh it a few months after he came of age. ‘‘ The 
Robbers ’’ is universally known. It is the marvellous 
production of a schoolboy Titan, endeavoring to take 
the heaven of invention by storm. Every thing is 
sketched in strong and glaring colors; vices and 
virtues are exhibited in their greatest light and dark- 


182 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


ness, with no intermediate shades. It is a monstrous 
production; but spirit and genius move in it, and 
impart to it permanent life. His maturer taste was not 
able to improve it. The merits and faults are so 
mingled, that it is now printed in its first and bold¬ 
est form. 

Schiller attempted the career of an actor, but 
without success. In the same period he published two 
other tragedies, in one of which his burning zeal for 
freedom expresses itself in a withering rebuke of the 
German Princes who were then selling their troops to 
fight against American independence. 

After some years, he gave the world Don Carlos, 
in which drama he unfolds his own heart, and gives 
the noblest lessons of liberty and public justice. The 
play is admirable, but has more of eloquence than of 
action, and more of the careful and elaborate views of 
a fine mind, than the passions of real life. 

The course of Schiller’s destiny led him next to the 
pursuits of history, for he became the successor of 
Eichhom, at the University of Jena. Kant and 
abstract philosophy also won his earnest attention. 
He applied himself to these pursuits seriously, for 
his object was to satisfy his inquisitive and impatient 
spirit. His lyre lay by his side almost untouched, 
while he was making every efibrt to acquire within 
himself that harmony which can alone result from clear 
convictions. At the same time his rejection of the 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 183 


realities of being, and longing for ideal goodness, 
wasted his physical powers; and the result of his 
irregular and too great apphcation, was an illness 
from which he never entirely recovered, and which 
contributed to impart more of gentleness to his intel¬ 
lectual character. He now strove to reconcile himself 
with the world. At this period, his character was fully 
established in its great outlines. In early life he had 
broken away from all patronage. “ The public,” he 
had exclaimed, “ is alone my sovereign, and my con¬ 
fidant. I belong to it exclusively. Before this tribu¬ 
nal, and before none other, will I plead. This only do 
I fear and reverence. I am elevated by the thought 
of bearing no chains but the decision of the world, of 
never again appealing to any other throne than the 
soul of humanity.” His noble nature, improved by 
careful study of the records of mankind, and raised to 
contemplative excellence by the zealous and solemn 
study of philosophy, was now restored to the career of 
poetry. A series of most beautiful lyrics, some 
of which are among the best in the literature of the 
world, were gradually published, and won universal 
favor. But the results of his investigations in history 
and speculative science were to be embodied in one 
grand production. It is not in the narrative of the 
Thirty Years’ War, but in the tragedy of Wallenstein, 
that the peculiarities of Schiller, at this time, are most 
clearly reflected. In the English drama, Macbeth 


184 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


is the production with which it has the nearest 
analogies. In the display of men, hurried to their 
ruin by a moral necessity existing in themselves, 
they are alike. But the inimitable master has laid 
his scene in remote and apocryphal history; in 
Wallenstein, we have real men, and events all too 
true; and this union of historic dignity and dramatic 
excellence was a triumph reserved for Schiller. 

Mary Stuart, and the Maid of Orleans, rapidly 
followed. In the first of these, Schiller has succeeded 
better than in any of his works, in delineating woman. 
It has in a less degree than Wallenstein the stern sub¬ 
limity which is unparted by the unseen influences of 
an avenging destiny; but it makes a more direct 
appeal to the human heart. The Maid of Orleans is a 
dramatic narrative written in the spirit of legendary 
romance; it is fuU of striking contrasts and marvellous 
interpositions, rather than a careful representation of hu¬ 
man agencies and passions. One of its scenes furnished 
to Scott the fine passage in Ivanhoe, where the Jewess 
observes the battle, and describes its progress to the 
imprisoned hero. 

The speculative tendency of Schiller’s mind led 
him to make an experiment of introducing the Greek 
chorus into modern tragedy. The experiment failed, 
and the Bride of Messina is sustained by the splendor 
of its several parts, not by its general merits. The 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 185 


poet returned at once to the right path, and history 
again lent itself to his genius. 

The love of humanity, the zeal for freedom and 
social progress, which pervade his lectures, essays, 
tragedies and poems, made him restless and anxious, 
in a season of deep dejection for the friends of liberty. 
For him the French Revolution seemed to have failed 
from the vices of its friends, and the despotism by which 
it was succeeded. The eagle of France was invading 
Germany; public virtue in sovereigns seemed exhaust¬ 
ed ; the people had not yet been disciplined into inde¬ 
pendent action. A deep gloom was settling on the 
prospects of his country. The darkness, which to him 
overspread the civil world, was as thick as that which 
shut the bard of Paradise from “ the sight of vernal 
bloom, or summer’s rose; ” and, like Milton, Schiller 
did but the more turn inward, preserving his trust un¬ 
impaired in the truths and in the providence which 
were to rescue liberty, and peace and virtue. At the 
opening of this century it had seemed to him that they 
could nowhere find a refuge; and reproving alike the 
military ambition of France and the commercial avarice 
of England, he complained despondingly that the search 
on earth is vain for the happy region where freedom pre¬ 
serves its freshness, and the beautiful youth of hu¬ 
manity its bloom. But hope never expired within 
him; in his last great production, he sketches Switzer¬ 
land and the life of the Swiss in unaffected simphcity. 


186 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


and founds a work of the sublimest character on the 
patriotism of a commonalty of peasants and herdsmen. 
His heart in its anguish dwelt in the vales of Uri and 
Unterwalden, the rocky shores of the lake of Lucerne, 
among the consecrated scenes of Altorf and Kiissnacht 
that had echoed the voice and borne the footsteps of 
William Tell. The poem which commemorates the 
emancipation of the three cantons, is the masterpiece 
of Schiller’s genius. In it he gave lessons of national 
independence, of resistance to tyrants, of the inalien¬ 
able right of the pure, laborious, peaceful husbandmen, 
to govern themselves. The interest of the play rests 
not on William TeU; but with infinite skill, which no¬ 
thing but affectionate sincerity could have inspired, it 
is diffused through the little nations that were lifting 
themselves into political independence, and gathers 
round the action more than the man. In this SchiUer 
has not been surpassed by poet or historian. Such 
was his last work, completed while the hour of death 
was dramng near. 

As the hart pants for the water brooks, he panted 
for the realms of truth, which puny despots and time¬ 
servers could not invade. He had studied the whole 
history of man, and nowhere found his visions realized. 
“It is the dove,” says a Trench biographer, “that 
quitted the ark to wander over all the earth, but find¬ 
ing nowhere rest for its wing, returned to its heaven- 
appointed shelter.” Just a few instants before his last 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 


187 


breath, a friend inquired of him how he was, and re¬ 
ceived the answer, “ Calmer and calmer.” 

“ E'en then,” says our own Bryant, who is of a 
kindred character, but bom in a happier land, 

“ E'en then he trod 
The threshold of the world unknown; 

Already, from the seat of God, 

A ray upon his garments shone— 

Shone and awoke that strong desire 

Eor love and knowledge reached not here, 

Till death set free his soul of fire, 

To plunge into its fitter sphere. 

Then who shall tell, how deep, how bright. 

The abyss of glory opened round; 

How thought and feeling flowed, hke fight. 
Through ranks of being without bound! ” 

Thus he died; just as the world was hoping from 
his maturity a series of works that might be associated 
with the best of the literary treasures which it has 
taken ages for human genius to accumulate. And yet 
he has been declared happy in the period of his death. 
In the memory of coming generations, men five as they 
are found when the angel of death summons them 
away. Schiller will be ever present, as dying in the 
noonday of his glory; and to gratitude for all that he 
was permitted to accomplish, there will ever be united 
a regret for what humanity has lost. Yet to him 
death was seasonable. Another year, and he would 


188 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


have seen the army of a detested enemy in his home, 
and the flag of foreign tyranny waving in triumph over 
the fairest parts of the land of his nativity. 

If we should compare any English poet with 
Schiller, it would be Byron. And yet there is stiU 
more room for contrast than comparison. Both were 
restless, and found no happiness in the world; but one 
was happy in himself: both were of wild and irregular 
habits of mind in early years; but of one the life was 
pm’e: both imparted the character of their respective 
passions to all the objects which they represented; but 
the one was som’ed to misanthropy, while the other 
glowed with benevolence. Schiller has produced no¬ 
thing like the narrative poems of Byron; but Byron 
must yield the palm in the drama. Both are among 
the best lyric poets of modern times; but here too 
Schiller is the superior. Both died in the vigor of 
life, the one a martyr to his art, the other to his zeal 
for liberty. 


IV. 


Goethe and Schiller are an antithesis. SchiUer, 
though ennobled, remained in sympathies essentially a 
plebeian; Goethe had the title and the views of a man 
of rank: Schiller was proudly independent, exhausting 
his life in unrelenting industry, rather than receive a 
pension; Goethe had no scruple in accepting from a 
prince enough for wants which he declares were not 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 189 


little. Schiller had a warm heart, and a mind which 
would think and utter itself freely; to Goethe the 
affections were subjects for dissection, and he always 
considered before he spoke. Schiller’s writings bear 
evidence of his discipline in the sublime lessons of 
Kant; Goethe rarely troubled himself about philosophy 
or religion. 

Of the value of Goethe’s poetry and the result of 
his influence different opinions exist; but it is too late 
to dispute his genius. Pericles is acknowledged to 
have been a consummate statesman, because he for 
forty years preserved his supremacy in the councils of 
one city; in the German republic of letters, opinions 
are as free and as flckle as was the popular voice at 
Athens ; and he who has had them in his favor for 
more than half a century, and has all that time been 
hazarding his reputation by new efforts, has given the 
clearest indications of unsurpassed power. Extensive 
and lasting popularity is the least questionable testi¬ 
mony to poetic excellence. If the multitude and the 
critic are at variance, the latter is in the wrong. The 
poet reflects the passions and sentiments of men; he 
cannot please long and widely, unless he reflects them 
with truth. 

The literary history of Goethe is explained by his 
private life. Frankfort, the place of his birth and early 
residence, facilitated the acquisition of his native lan¬ 
guage in all its richness; at the same time the free im- 


190 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


perial city, the theatre of the emperor’s coronation, 
imbued his imagination from childhood with mediaeval 
images. At the university of Leipzig he found little 
that was in harmony with his tastes; he was there¬ 
fore driven to look into his own heart and intrust 
its experiences to verse. His earliest productions 
took the color of his studies and his emotions. The 
strictly national drama of Goethe shows how fondly he 
had looked into the antiquities of Germany; and in 
Werther he introduced all that observation and ex¬ 
perience had taught him of the wasting vehemence 
of love. 

Two years after the appearance of Werther, Goethe 
is found at Weimar, in the full enjoyment of public ap¬ 
plause, possessed of the affectionate regard of the 
prince, who had just inherited the ducal purple, sur¬ 
rounded by the best artists and scholars of Germany, 
and admired at court by a circle celebrated for its 
refinement. In due time he was honored with the 
various civil titles which are most coveted by his coun¬ 
trymen. The pencil of Raphael almost made him 
a cardinal; skill in poetry introduced Goethe into the 
council of his sovereign; but he never was withdrawn 
from literature by political ambition. 

A change went forward in the character of Goethe’s 
mind. Though possessed of public favor, and con¬ 
scious of unexhausted resources, he for twelve years 
published nothing of importance; but the society of 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 191 


Weimar, a tour in Switzerland, reflection and study, 
contributed each in its degree to finish his education as 
a poet. At last, in 1786, he was seized with an irre¬ 
sistible longing to go beyond the Alps, and his sovereign 
enabled him to gratify the passion for traveUing; that 
passion, which is stronger than ambition, and stronger 
than love; which has relieved detlironed monarchs of 
their weariness, and allured statesmen from pubhc life; 
which tempted Caesar from victory and Cleopatra 
to gaze at the cataracts of the Nile, and drew an 
illustrious Swedish queen from a reign of glory to 
the ruins of Rome. Had Italy nothing but its sky 
and its scenery, where nature has exhibited her love¬ 
liest forms; or its poetry, which contains all that can 
delight and elevate the imagination; or its music, 
chanted in the streets, given in full choirs in the 
churches, charming the senses by the artful combina¬ 
tions of harmony in operas, and heard in aU its ten¬ 
derness and perfection at the vespers in St. Peter’s and 
the choruses of the Holy Week; or its buildings and 
statues; or its pictures, which exhibit not only all that 
is most pleasing in real life, but all ideal lovehness; or 
its recollections, not of the ancient heroes of the com¬ 
monwealth only, but of Petrarch, Raphael and Michael 
Angelo; or lastly, the race which now dwells there ; it 
would be a country fit to enrich the mind of the 
traveller with images, excite and diversify his inventive 


192 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


powers, and impart a poetic impulse to all his faculties. 
Goethe entered it in the best years of early manhood, 
possessing a cultivated taste, a lively perception of the 
beautiful, a judgment improved by study and fitted to 
observe and compare. What wonder, then, that a resi¬ 
dence in Italy of two years should have formed an 
epoch in his personal history. 

At the period of his return from Italy, the intellec¬ 
tual character of Goethe was matured. His Paust had 
been an invention of his youth, but was now finished 
with the severest care. His Iphigenia, and his Tasso, 
are monuments of industrious genius, which his coun¬ 
trymen admire with one voice, and which posterity will 
not suffer to perish. His memory was all the while 
acquiring new stores of thought, and his love of 
art was gratified by the most varied studies. And 
this is perhaps the only point, in which the inventive 
writer has the advantage over the man of science. 
The latter is more sure that industry will ultimately be 
followed by reputation and opportunities of usefulness; 
yet he must limit his investigations, and subordinate 
general culture to his particular pursuit. But it is the 
duty of the former to roam wherever there are flowers, 
to contemplate excellence of one particular class till 
the mind has become enriched by it, and then to pass 
onwards to new stores of information and new sources 
of beauty; so that every principle of human nature, 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 193 


every passion, feeling, and power may be developed, 
disciplined, and brought to its highest perfection. 

The later works of Goethe are characterized by 
dignity, composure, and deliberation. Having ac¬ 
quired a knowledge of man by a ready tdent at obser¬ 
vation, and having possessed himself of extensive learn¬ 
ing, which, though it may in itself be barren, fertilizes 
and adorns, he continued to write mth perfect self- 
possession, to plan with coolness, and to finish with 
effort and care. In a word, the years of his appren¬ 
ticeship were over, and he had become a consum¬ 
mate master in his art. Werther had been written 
in four weeks. His productions were no longer 
the accidental effusions of genius, but the finished 
works of an artist, considerate in the use of his re¬ 
sources, and regularly and harmoniously advancing to 
the accomplishment of his design. The dramatic poem, 
Tasso, the performance in which, perhaps, the German 
language appears in its most perfect state, bears the 
marks of long study and care; and Wilhelm Meister 
occupied its author for more than fifteen years. 

If Goethe, amidst his unequalled success in Ger¬ 
many, has not in the same degree obtained the suf¬ 
frages of other nations, the causes exist in the character 
of his works. Instead of describing sentiments of ten¬ 
derness and true humanity, he has more frequently 
sketched the sorrows which spring from the imagina¬ 
tion, and the vices of refinement. In Germany, the 
13 


194 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


characters in the Elective Affinities are acknowledged 
.to be drawn with truth; in the United States, the 
book would be thrown aside as a false and dangerous 
libel on human nature. 

Among the ancients we hear nothing of the tor¬ 
ments of a diseased or ill regulated mind, at least till 
the age of Sappho. A man like Rousseau could not 
have been formed under the institutions of Attica; 
beings like Childe Harold and Lara of the English 
poets, or Eaust and Tasso of the German, could not 
have been invented by an early Greek writer. Human 
nature, and usually under a cheerful aspect, as the dis¬ 
penser of social happiness and the mother of generous 
actions, was the theme of the epic and tragic muse. 
The bard of Chios was the friend of man; and in the 
spirit of cheerful benevolence exhibits Glaucus rejoicing 
in his youth and glowing with generous emulation; 
Nestor, though he had seen three races of men fade 
before him, still complacently contemplating the labors 
and changes of being; Hector, in the season of danger, 
yielding for a moment to the softness of parental affec¬ 
tion. In Homer, the scenes are hopeful as on the 
morning of a battle, when the war horse is prancing, 
and the hero exulting as a strong man before a race. 
But Goethe presents the field at evening, when the 
weary ai-e retiring from the conflicts of life, with 
mangled limbs and heavy hearts. He depicts men 
driven to despair and suicide by hopeless desire, women 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 195 

languishing from a passion, which their own innocence 
condemns; persons of delicate sensibility brooding over 
unreal pains, till they turn every object in nature into 
nutriment for their weakness, and ‘‘ drink misanthropy 
even from the sources of love.’' 

But not only has Goethe described the perverted 
sentiments which grow out of vicious refinement. 
Some of his works are offensive from the indifference 
to moral effect, pervading both their plan and exe¬ 
cution. There is cause to express both surprise and 
disgust, that a man of fine genius, conversant with the 
sentiments and principles which are the living springs 
of beauty; a man, who, as he observes of himself, had 
received the veil of poetry from the hand of truth, 
should have stooped to win a disgraceful popularity by 
appeals to the weakness and unworthy passions of 
human nature, and darkened the clear revelations of 
celestial beauty by the mixture of earthly passions. 

Bor derelictions like these a just indignation need 
not spare its censure; but it must still be acknowl¬ 
edged that Goethe has excelled all his countrymen in the 
ease and grace of his style; and his superiority is still 
more conspicuous in his variety. Indeed, no two of his 
works have the same character. Other writers multiply 
their efforts on some one congenial class of subjects; 
Goethe is universal. He delineates not a portion of the 
world, but the whole. Misfortune moves freely over the 
earth, and joy selects for itself no aristocracy; in hke 


196 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


manner, the poet has allowed himself to wander into all 
classes of society, and has brought back inspiration 
from all. He treats successfully a multitude of sub¬ 
jects which would have bewildered inferior men. With 
the step of serene activity and unimpassioned judg¬ 
ment, he walks, like the enchanted hero of an eastern 
romance, through the hundred halls of the palace of in¬ 
vention, and aU the gates fly open at his approach ; but 
hardly has he entered, when the portals close again, so 
that none can foUow in his footsteps. 

The character of Goethe’s mind is that of self- 
possession. No pining passion prostrates the energy 
of will; no crazed imagination corrupts the healthy 
exercise of judgment. The author of Werther is the 
very last man who would have killed himself for love ; 
the poet who has delineated Tasso’s exquisite sensi¬ 
bility, was never a misanthrope or a hypochondriac. 
The stream of life gushes for him from a clear fountain, 
and during all its course has reflected the light of day. 
This it is, which distinguishes him from Rousseau and 
Byron, from Tasso and Schiller. The peculiar mark set 
upon all his writings is a placid contentment with nature 
and reality. He never turned in disgust from the world 
in which he has his being. Life and man are his 
themes. He does not require to annihilate every thing 
that is clear and individual around him, in order to 
gain free exercise for fancy in an ideal world; he is 
like the fabled giants, who were strongest when their 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 197 


feet touched the earth. There is in him no trace of 
sickliness of mind, no lines worn by a diseased ima¬ 
gination. The beings who move, speak, and act in his 
works, are men and women, of veriest flesh and blood. 
It is of human hfe that he unfolds the panorama. 

The manner of Goethe is generally elaborately 
finished. Let every young man take a lesson from the 
master in this; he always wrote with difficulty. He 
held it a duty to labor, and did not take advantage of 
his talent to ’wiite with slovenly facihty. Yet he leaves 
upon his works no traces of the toil which they cost 
him; we are introduced at once to a splendid and 
highly finished edifice, but all the instruments of 
preparation are removed. 

Hence it is that he does not excel in fragments 
merely. His works, as such, merit admiration. It is 
not in parts that he deserves praise, so much as in the 
whole. To the reflecting reader he furnishes abundant 
lessons ; those who clap their hands only at fine lines, 
and care little for complete perfection of workmanship, 
Goethe takes no pains to please. He is uniform and 
sustained; and his best passages derive a peculiar 
charm from their adaptation and fitness. 

The drama of Taust is the production most nearly 
exhibiting the general cast of thought which pervades 
the writings of Goethe. All its scenes have an air of 
reality ; and with much that is coarse and offensive, it 
describes vice in the fathomless depths of its misery. 


198 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


But tlie greatness of tlie play consists in its faithful re¬ 
flection of the sensuahty and skepticism which were 
characteristic of the author’s times. It is an age of 
analysis confessing its want of all faith, and the preva¬ 
lence of that spirit of doubt, which would gladly drown 
its troublesome restlessness in pleasures, but only finds 
itself more and more disquieted. Milton invests Satan 
with the majesty of an archangel; Mephistopheles is a 
very devil, hideous and mean, ridiculing all noble feel¬ 
ing, scoffing at human knowledge and aspirations; and 
he holds Paust so riveted to him, that the poor victim 
who had paid his own soul to purchase the right to 
command, is neither able nor willing to free himself 
from grovelling subjection to his base companion, who 
hurries him from one excess to another, nearer and 
nearer to the gloom of despair. 

A great poet is the mirror of his time, just as a 
great philosopher is the exponent of its general culture. 
Goethe is in one sense the representative of his age. 
The philosophy of Descartes had introduced the spirit 
of skepticism; Voltaire, beginning with skepticism, 
had proceeded to the work of analysis; and in the 
general proving to which all things were subjected, a 
generation seemed resolved on considering what was to 
be thrown away, and not what was to be preserved. 
The Titans went forth to destroy; and in the over¬ 
throw of ancient superstitions, forms of government and 
thought, the old world seemed ooming to an end. At 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 199 


this period Goethe appeared. He lived before the 
European mind was ready to rebuild, and after it 
had caused the time-honored institutions to totter. 
Eaith in verbal inspiration was gone; and it was 
still rather the fashion to deny the existence of the 
soul, than to look for sources of truth within it. This 
is the moral and political aspect of Goethe as a writer. 
He is not a destructive. He came into a world of 
ruins ; but he had not vigor to continue the warfare, nor 
creative power to construct anew. And thus he floated 
down the current passively; adhering to the past, yet 
knowing that it was the past; no iconoclast himself, 
yet knowing that the old images, before which men 
bowed do’wn, were demolished. His works have no 
glimmering of faith; he cries hist! and lets the multi¬ 
tude continue to adore the idol which he knows to be 
broken. His infidelity reaches to the afiections and to 
intelligence. He writes of love; and it is to recount its 
sufferings, and leave the sincere lover to shoot himself. 
He writes of a hero, the liberator of his country, the 
martyr for its independence; and confounding patriot¬ 
ism with libertinism, he casts aside the father of a 
family, whom history had extolled, to represent a reck¬ 
less seducer. He writes of a scholar, outwatching the 
bear, becoming wise with stores of all knowledge, and 
makes him so dissatisfied by his acquisitions, as to sell 
himself to the Devil for the opportunity of sensual 


200 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


enjoyment. Every where the pages of Goethe are 
stamped with evidence, that he has no faith in 
reason, or in the affections; in God, in man, or in wo¬ 
man. Will you have the type of Goethe’s character ? 
Behold it in his conduct. In his earlier life he joined 
the army of Prussians, when it invaded Prance to 
restore the Bourbons. He was no Roman Catholic; 
he knew that legitimacy was a worn-out superstition; 
he knew that the old noblesse of Prance had lost 
its vitality; and yet he takes up arms to compel 
the worship of the public at deserted shrines and 
broken altars. Such was he in opening manhood; 
such was he as a writer; such was he throughout 
his pilgrimage. Goethe,—^who in youth was indif¬ 
ferent to God, and reverential only towards rank 
and the Bourbons,—^Goethe, who, in his maturity, 
while his country was trodden underfoot by foreign 
invaders, quietly studied Chinese or made experiments 
in natural philosophy,—Goethe, who wrote a fulsome 
marriage-song to grace the nuptials of Napoleon,— 
Goethe, the man of letters, who, in his age becoming a 
Duke’s minister, almost alone, with but one ally, stood 
out against the freedom of the press,—Goethe, is the 
poet, who represents the morals, the politics, the ima¬ 
gination, the character, of the broken-down aristocracy, 
that hovered on the skirts of defeated dynasties, and 
gathered as a body-guard round the bier of legitimacy. 

Goethe is inferior to Voltaire, not in genius and 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 201 


industry only, but still more in morality. The Trench- 
man had humanity; he avenged the persecuted; he 
had courage, and dealt vigorous blows for men who 
were wronged. His influence was felt in softening the 
asperity of codes, in asserting freedom of mind, in 
denouncing the severity that could hate protestantism 
and philosophy even to disfranchisement, exile, and the 
shedding of blood. But Goethe never risked a fromi 
of a German prince for any body. He was a prudent 
man, and, in the great warfare of opinion, kept quietly 
out of harm’s way. On religious subjects, he mys¬ 
tified; on political subjects, he was discreetly silent, 
except that he adored rank; worshipping birth like ' 
intellect, and ever ready with flattery for the ruling 
powers. 

Goethe has sometimes been the divinity of men, 
who rely on the spontaneous action of human na¬ 
ture, and reverence impulse as the voice of God. 
But a just analysis does not sustain their preference. 
He never was carried away by a holy enthusiasm for 
truth or freedom. On the contrary, Goethe was one 
of the most wary, calculating, circumspect people of his 
times. He did not speak unpleasant things in a tone 
louder than a whisper; he kept his thoughts to him¬ 
self, if his thoughts were likely to give offence in high 
places. In all his w^orks,—except perhaps in some of 
the feeble, rambling, ill-conceived, diffusely-executed 
productions of his extreme age,—^there is not a line. 


202 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


which would by possibility excite the distrust, alarm 
the sensitiveness, or twinge the conscience of the profli¬ 
gate aristocrat; the empress of Austria will find in every 
line of his poems to persons, that the poet knew the 
awful distance between himself and the high per¬ 
sonages whom he flattered; and the emperor Francis 
could consider his politics orthodox. A free press was 
to him not at aU desirable. He had already so ruled 
his own spirit, that the words it uttered had no need 
to fear an imperial censor. “ Royalists,’’ he says, 
“Royalists, who have the power in their hands, 
should not talk, but act. They may march troops, 
and behead, and hang. That is all right. But to 
argue is not their proper way. I have always been 
a royalist. I have let others babble. I understood 
my course, and knew what my object was.” In 
history his judgments are analogous. Marathon 
was a name that found no interpreter in his breast. 
The field on which the hopes of human freedom were 
redeemed, was in his view eclipsed by Waterloo. 
Or hear him explain the true foundation of parties. 
“ Much is said,” exclaims the rival, as he calls himself, 
of Napoleon, of Frederick 11., and of Luther, “ Much 
is said of aristocracy and democracy; but the whole 
afiair is simply this: In youth, when we possess 
nothing, we are democrats; but when we have come 
to possess something of our own, we wish to be 
secure.” “ Freedom,” he says, “ consists in knowing 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 203 


lioAv to respect what is above us.” And, again: “ If a 
man has freedom enough to live in health, and Avork at 
his craft, he has enough.” Goethe expresses his deep 
sympathy for Lord Byi’on, who had the folly to speak 
out all that he thought; and he entreats ‘‘ pity ” for 
Lessing, because Lessing Avould speak his mind, Avould 
“meddle,” as he expresses it, would share the polem¬ 
ical character of his times; Avould insist on taking oc¬ 
casion to “vent his pique against priests and against 
princes.” And Goethe sums up the whole mystery of 
pohtical Avisdom in the following maxims: “ The art of 
governing requires an apprenticeship; no one should 
meddle Avith it before having learned it.”—“Let the 
shoemaker abide by his last, the peasant by his plough, 
and the king by his sceptre.” He condenses his sys¬ 
tem into three hnes, which he puts into the mouth of 
Tasso: 

“ Her Mensch ist nicht geboren frey zu seyn; 

Und fiir den Edlen ist kein schoner Gliick, 

Als einem Eiirsten, den er ehrt, zu dienen.” 

This Avas written in the period of the American Revo¬ 
lution, and is in plain English, “ Man is not born to be 
free.” Mark the meaning; man is not only not bom 
free, but not designed by Providence “to be free.” 

In morals and their theory, and in philosophy, 
Goethe is true to the character Avhich he displayed 
in actual life. In every thing that relates to firmness 
of principle, to love for truth itself, to humanity, to 


204 


GERMAN LITERATURE. 


holiness, to love of freedom, he holds perhaps the 
lowest place. Byron, Voltaire, Shelley, soar far above 
him in generous feelings. 

Yet Goethe has made an epoch. In the art of 
writing German he has no superior. He entered 
on the career of letters, at a time when his country¬ 
men had not obtained mastery over their language, 
and in German style, he became the instructor of his 
nation. It has been said of Dryden, that from his 
writings sometimes not a word can be spared. The 
admirer of Goethe may turn to his prose, where a 
golden style, slightly tinged with mannerism, possesses 
clearness, richness, moderation, and melody; to his 
smaller poems, where often for pages together no 
word but the right one occurs; where each word 
is in its proper place; and where the little song, 
in its terseness, its completeness, and its felicity of 
expression, leaves nothing to be desired. Coarseness 
abounds; but again there are poems which are of the 
utmost delicacy, pure in the conception and harmonious 
in the execution. His Herman and Dorothea is a 
strictly national idyl, in which the German manners 
are portrayed, in a plain and almost homely but grace¬ 
ful manner, with inimitable truth; and again in his 
drama of Tasso, which has no other object than to 
depict a condition of mind, the nicest shades of senti¬ 
ment, and the most exquisitely refined tastes, are 
described in language of perfect harmony. In Egmont 


THE AGE OF SCHILLER AND GOETHE. 205 

we find ourselves transported to the streets of Brussels, 
mixing in the popular clamors and complaints of the 
disaffected Netherlands; and it would almost seem, 
that the tragic muse of the Greeks had herself dictated 
Iphigenia to a worthy disciple of Euripides. 

At the close we must again concede to Goethe 
that quality which distinguishes Scott, and in which 
Shakspeare was of all English writers pre-eminait— 
Truth in his descriptions. This, combined with the 
beautiful style and artistic skill of an accomplished 
master, will preserve through all the vicissitudes of taste 
the fame of a poet, whom universal consent would 
revere as one of the greatest of all time, if he had con¬ 
nected the culture of art with the service of humanity. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


[The few pieces wliicli Mow, were written at a 
very early period of life; some of them while the trans¬ 
lator was stih a student.] 

THE IDEALS. 

SoHILLEE. 

Schiller having arrived at the age of five and thirty, 
bids farewell to the illusions of his youth. 

And wilt thou, fond deceiver, leave me. 

With scenes that smiled in fancy’s eye. 

With all, that once could glad or grieve me. 

With all inexorably fiy ? 

Can naught delay thy rapid motion? 

Can naught life’s golden season save? 

’Tis vain ; eternity’s vast ocean 
Receives the streamlet’s hastening wave. 

The dazzling light has long been spent. 

Which round the paths of childhood shone; 

The chains of fancy all are rent. 

And all her fair creations fiown. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


207 


The pleasing faith has passed away 
In beings, which my visions bore ; 
Reality has made its prey 
Of what seemed beautiful before. 

As once with vehement desire 
Pygmalion held in warm embrace 
The statue, till sensation’s fire 
Glowed in the marble’s kindling face; 

I threw the arms of youthful love 
Round nature, till I too was blest, 

TiU she began to breathe, to move, 

To live on my poetic breast. 

Starting to life, she shared my bliss; 
Por me the dumb possessed a voice. 
Learned to return me love’s warm kiss. 
Peel my heart’s music, and rejoice. 
Then lived to me the tree, the rose. 
Then sang the fountain’s silver fall; 
And things, that spiritless repose. 
Echoed with joy my spirit’s call. 


Itself a universe, the breast 
Aspired with strong, resistless force, 
To act and speak, and onward prest 
To join in life’s exciting course. 


208 


TRANSLATIONS. 


While in the bud it lay concealed, 

The world appeared a boundless scene; 
What have the opening leaves revealed ? 
How little ! and that little mean ! 


By daring mind endued with wings, 
Blest by his visions false but gay. 
Untamed by anxious care, how springs 
The youth along existence’ way! 
There’s nought so lofty, nought so far. 
To which his wishes may not rise; 
E’en to the heaven’s remotest star. 

On wings of bold design he flies. 


How swiftly was I borne along! 

And happy feared nor toil nor care ! 

With winning grace a friendly throng 
Before me danced of forms of air; 

Love with sweet looks that ne’er could frown; 
Joy with his golden garlands bright; 

Glory adorned with starry crown; 

And Truth, that blazed in solar light. 

But ah! how soon these guardians flew 
Ear from my side, ere life’s mid-day ; 

The airy band became untrue. 

And one by one they turned away. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


209 


His rapid pinions Joy extended; 

The wells of Knowledge all were dry; 
Doubt’s heavy clouds round Truth ascended, 
And hid her light from mortal eye. 


I saw, too. Glory’s holy flowers 
Round common brows profanely twined; 
And, Love, how swiftly flew thy hours ! 
How soon I left thy spring behind! 

Still and more still the scene became; 
More lonely seemed the rugged way; 
And dying hope a pallid flame 
Scarce threw across the darksome way. 


Of all that gay and noisy crowd 
Will none with faithful fondness wait, 

To raise me when by sorrow bowed. 

And follow me to death’s dark gate ? 

O friendship ! thou my age shalt brighten. 
Thou, who dost heal our every wound. 
With love the cares of life dost lighten, 
Thou, whom I early sought and found. 

And thou, whose spell like hers can charm 
The spirit’s storms, beloved Employ; 

Tliou, who with strong, unwearied arm. 
Dost hopeful raise, but ne’er destroy; 

14 


210 


TRANSLATIONS. 


The building of eternity 
Slowly thy patient toil uprears, 

From time’s great debt before we die, 
Strikes minutes, hours, and days, and years. 


FRIDOLIN, OR THE JOURNEY TO THE FORGE. 


A guileless page was Fridolin, 

As from my tale ye’ll learn; 

He served with heart, that knew no sin, 
The Countess of Savern. 

She was all gentleness to him; 

But any wish of hers, or whim. 

The wayward bent of woman’s wiU, 

He would have hastened to fulfil. 


II. 

From morning’s dawn, when day first shone, 
TiU evening’s twilight died. 

He lived for her commands alone. 

Yet ne’er was satisfied; 

And if she bade him ‘‘ Toil no more,” 

His glistening eye with tears ran o’er; 

Nor e’er from labor would he rest. 

Till weariness his limbs opprest. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


211 


III. 

Therefore above the servant crowd, 

She loved the youth to raise, 

While from her beauteous lips there flowed 
Incessantly his praise. 

Nor of her servants seemed he one; 

Her heart esteemed him as a son; 

And oft her eye reposed with joy 
On the sweet features of the boy. 


IV. 

For this there rose in Robert’s breast. 
The huntsman, deadly hate; 

His envious bosom never ceased 
With malice to dilate. 

And to the count, whose honest heart 
Was open to the traitor’s art. 

And quickly kindled, he drew nigh. 
To plant the seeds of jealousy. 


V. 

i 

Thus mth deceitful words he spake : 

‘‘ O count, I deem you blest; 

No jealous doubts your slumbers break. 
Nor haunt your golden rest; 

For you so chaste a spouse possess ! 
Discretion guards her loveliness; 

And all the mles of wooing youth 
Were vain against her virtue’s truth.” 


212 


TRANSLATIONS. 


VI. 

At this the count with frowning brow 

Exclaimed—What say’st thou, knave ? 

I build no trust on woman’s vow, 

Unstable as the wave. 

But though fair words their hearts allure. 

My lady’s troth I hold secure; 

Love’s eye on her none dare to turn, 

Or woo the spouse of Count Savern.”— 

VII. 

The wily keeper speaks—“ ’Tis clear, 
Contempt the fool deserves, 

"Who, born to serve thee and to fear. 

Thus from his duty swerves. 

And to the lady he obeys. 

An eye of longing dares to raise.” 

Trembling Avith wrath the count rephes, 

‘‘ The villain, that hath dared it, dies.”— 

VIII. 

“ And can it be ? the public tale 
To thee hath ne’er been told ? 

Yet what my Lord desires to veil. 

My lips shall ne’er unfold.”— 

“ Speak, wretch, or die; what hast thou seen ? ” 
Exclaims the count with threatening mien, 
Who hopes her favor to engage ? ”— 

“ I speak, sire, of the fair-haired page. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


213 


IX. 

The stripling hath a pleasing form.” 

Thus he deceives his lord, 

Whose blood by turns ran cold and warm, 
Thrilling at every word. 

‘‘ And have you truly never known. 

That he hath eyes for her alone, 

Of you at table hath no care. 

But languishes behind her chair ? 


X. 

Here in these verses is confessed 
His passion’s bold desire ”— 

Confessed !”—He hath the countess pressed 
To love with equal fire. 

The lady is discreet and good. 

She feared for him your angry mood; 

’Twere useless to repeat the tale; 

Bor what to you could that avail ? ” 


XI. 

At this the count grew wroth, and rode 
To where a forest rose. 

And fires in many a furnace glowed; 

There melted iron flows ; 

Early and late with zealous speed 
The glaring flames his servants feed; 
The sparks ascend; the bellows play; 
As though the rocks would melt away. 


14 


TRANSLATIONS. 


XII. 

There might you see their wondrous force 
Both fire and water blend ; 

To urge the wheel’s revolving course 
Their power the torrents lend; 

The works keep up their ceaseless chime; 
The heavy hammers strike in time; 

And e’en the iron pliant grows, 

Subdued and shaped by mighty blows. 


XIII. 

Straight at their master’s beck there come 
Two servants from their task;— 

The first, whom I shall send from home 
To greet you, and to ask 
If ye’ve obeyed your master well. 

Him seize, and throw in yonder hell; 

The flaming furnace be his grave; 

I would not see again the slave.” 


XIV. 

Infernal joy the demons feel. 

To hear that dark behest; 

Bor hardened were their hearts like steel; 

No mercy touched their breast. 

Aloft the smoking pile they raise; 

The flames ascend with crackling blaze; 
They thirst for crime, and long to slay. 
With murderous will, their destined prey. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


215 


XV. 

Robert on this his comrade calls, 

AVho nought of malice knew; 

“Now haste thee to our master’s halls ; 

He needs thy service true.” 

The count then spake to Pridolin, 

“ Straight wend to where my forge’s din 
Is heard; and of my slaves inquire, 

If they’ve fulfilled their lord’s desire.”— 


XVI. 

“’Tis mine,” he answers, “to obey,” 

And hastes his will to do; 

Then paused—“ Perchance my mistress may 
Have duties for me too.” 

Before the countess soon he bows ; 

“Porth to the forge thy servant goes; 

Thine is my duty ; lady, say. 

Thee can I serve upon the way ? ” 

XVI I. 

Thereat the countess called him near. 

And spake with gentle tone; 

“ The holy mass I long to hear. 

But sickness wastes my son. 

Go then, my child, and on thy way 
Por me in still devotion pray ; 

With penitence thy sins efface; 

And then for me entreat heaven’s grace.” 


TRANSLATIONS. 


XVIII. 

The sacred charge was doubly sweet; 

He rose and journeyed fast; 

Yet through the neighboring village street 
He had not fairly passed, 

When on his ear distinctly fell 
The sacred curfew’s mellow peal, 

Which summons sinners to repent, 

And taste the holy sacrament. 


XIX. 

“ To fly from God were surely sin 
When in the road we meet.” 

He sees the church, and enters in. 
Yet hears few coming feet; 

Tor ’twas the harvest-tide, and then 
Its toil detamed the husbandmen; 
None came the sacred hymns to sing, 
Or chant the mass, or censer swing. 


XX. 

At once the page resolves to stay 
And serve as sacristan; 

“ Sure this,” thought he, “ is no delay ; 

Tirst serve the Lord, then man.” 

The belt and stole, which priests should wear^ 
He hangs upon the priest with care; 

The burnished cups he next displays, 
Preserved for mass on holy days. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


217 


XXI. 

When this with cautious hand was done, 
Before the priest he stands; 

Devoutly to the shrine moves on, 

The mass-book in his hands. 

And right and left he meekly kneels. 

And careful at the signal wheels; 

And when the words of ‘‘ Sanctus ” came. 
His bell thrice tinkled at the name. 


XXII. 

Then as the priest with reverence bowed. 
Kneeling before the shrine, 

And high, with hands uplifted, showed 
The Eucharist divine; 

The sacristan, observing well. 

Rings loudly with his little bell; 

All cross their brows, their bosoms beat. 
And Christ the Saviour kneeling greet. 

XXIII. 

Thus careful he performed each part 
With readiness and skill; 

He knew the sacred rites by heart. 

And served with cheerful will; 
Served till the close unwearied thus; 

Till with “ Vobiscum Dominus ’’ 

The priest before the people bends. 

The holy service blessing ends. 


218 


TRANSLATIONS. 


XXIV. 

Then where the priests their, vessels kept, 
The sacred gear he laid; 

With busy hand the church he swept; 

This done, no longer stayed; 

But now with conscience in repose. 
Straight to the forge with speed he goes; 
And yet his heart still bids him say 
Twelve Pater-Nosters by the way. 


XXV. 

And as he sees the curling flames. 

And near the workmen stand, 

‘‘ Have ye obeyed,’' the youth exclaims. 

Our master’s strict command ? ” 

The hateful demons grin at this. 

And pointing to the hot abyss, 

‘‘We merit trust, the count will own, 

Por nothing’s left of flesh or bone.” 

XXVI. 

And swift the nearest pathway home 
The page returning took; 

But as his master saw him come. 

He gazed with doubting look. 

“Whence com’st thou, wretch? I fain would 
know.”— 

“ I come from yonder forge.”—“ Not so; 

Or hast thou loitered by the way ? ”— 

“ My lord, I tarried but to pray. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


219 


XXVII. 

As from thy face my steps I bent 
This very mom, forgive, 

To ask my duty first I went 
To her, for whom I live. 

‘ Go, hear the mass,’ my lady said; 

Her words I willingly obeyed; 

And thrice my sacred beads went thi’ough 
Por her salvation and for you.” 

XXVIII. 

The count was rapt in deep amaze, 

And horror o’er him fell; 

“ What answer, where the forges blaze. 
Was made thee ? Quickly tell.”— 

“ They pointed to the curling smoke. 

And darkly thus the ruffians spoke; 

‘ We merit tmst, the count will o^vn, 

Por nothing’s left of flesh or bone.’ ” 


XXIX. 

“ And Robert? ” cold with curdling blood 
The count impatient cried; 

‘‘ This morn I sent him to the wood; 

Hast thou his track espied ?”— 

“ In field and forest, sire. I’ve been. 

But Robert’s footsteps have not seen.”— 

“ Now,” cries the count, and looks aghast. 
Our God himself hath sentence passed.” 


220 


TRANSLATIONS. 


XXX. 

The count, unused to actions bland, 
Beyond his wont grew kind ; 

And grasps his faithful servant’s hand. 
And hastes his spouse to find. 

“ I pray thy favor for this child; 

No angel is so undefiled; 

The traitor’s malice is revealed; 

God and his hosts the guiltless shield.” 


THE DIVISION OF THE EARTH. 

SOHILLEE. 

‘‘ Take ye the world,” cried Jove from heaven’s far height 
To mortals; “ take it all to keep, or spend; 

I give it for your heritance and right. 

But share it wisely, friend with friend.” 

To seize his part, in busy haste, uprose 
Both young and old, whoever had but hands ; 

The hunter through the forest lordly goes. 

The farmer claims the fruit of lands. 

His magazines with wares the merchant loads. 

The abbot stores the choicest vineyards’ wine ; 

The king bars up the bridges and the roads, 

And loud proclaims—The tithe is mine. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


221 


At last, when the division long was o’er, 

From some far distant spot the poet came; 

He came too late! for there was nothing more; 
Owners appeared each gift to claim. 

“ Alas ! Alas ! Shall I then, I of all. 

Thy truest offspring, be forgot alone?” 

Thus to the God did he complaining call. 

And threw himself before Jove’s throne. 

‘‘If in the land of dreams thou wouldst delay,” 
Replied the God, “then quarrel not with me; 
Where wast thou when the world was given away ?” 
“ I was,” replied the bard, “ with thee. 

“ Mine eye hung dazzled on thy features bright, 
Mine ear upon thy heavens’ sweet harmonies; 
Forgive the soul, that blinded with thy light. 

Lost earth, to revel in the skies.” 

“ What shall I do ? ” says Jove; “ Fve nought to give, 
The harvest, market, chase, no more are mine; 

But dost thou wish with me in heaven to live. 

Come when thou wilt, that heaven is thine.” 

MY CREED. 

• SOHILLEK. 

Wliat’s my religion ? None of all the sects. 

Which thou hast named. “ And why not ? ” From 
religion. 


222 


TRANSLATIONS. 


THE SKEPTICS. 

SOHILLEE. 

Men now prove all things, search within, without; 
Truth ! how canst thou escape the fierce pursuit ? 
With staves and nets have they gone out to take thee ; 
Thou, like a spirit, marchest through the crowd. 


KANT AND HIS COMMENTATORS. 

SOHILLEE. 

How one rich man so many beggars feeds ! 

When monarchs build, the draymen find employ. 


COLUMBUS. 

SOHILLEE. 

Sail, fearless mariner, though slower wits 
Speak lightly of thy daring, and the hands 
Of the spent helmsman sink so wearily. 

Still to the west; there shall the shore be found. 
Distant, yet by thy reason clearly seen. 

Trust in the God that guides thee; follow still 
The world’s wide ocean, though its silent waves 
Should nought reveal; for did not yet the land 
Exist, e’en now ’twould rise for thee to being. 
Nature and genius in eternal league 
Are joined; and one performs, what one has promised. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


223 


THE WORDS OF FAITH. 

SOHILLEE. 

Three words I repeat; and their meaning is high; 

From spirit to spirit they go ; 

Though with us, they never are seen by the eye ; 
Their truth can the heart only know; 

The glory of man overshadowed will be, 

When he ceases to cherish and trust in the three. 

For Liberty man was created ; in chains 
His freedom he never can lose; 

Nor doubt, though the rabble her sanctity stains. 
And fools the high watchword abuse; 

Should slaves burst their fetters, be glad without fedr; 
Nor tremble at danger when freemen draw near. 

And Virtue is more than a perishing sound; 

She can bloom in your deeds while ye live; 

The weakness of mortals your efforts may bound. 
Yet man for perfection may strive; 

The wisdom that pride from the learned conceals. 

The life of the guileless in action reveals. 

And God lives ; his infinite spirit hath power, 
Though man’s fickle will is but nought; 

High rules above space and the hurrying hour 
The Father of life and of thought. 

Wliile the world of decay and of changes complams. 
Serene ’mid the changes his spirit remains. 


224 


TRANSLATIONS. 


The three words ye should cherish; their meaning 
is high; 

Prom mind be they echoed to mind; 

They are with us, though ne’er are they seen by the 

eye, 

But their witness within us they find. 

The glory of man never darkened can be, 

So long as he fiimly believes in the three. 


THE FLOWER ANGELS. 

Rueokeet. 

As delicate forms, as is thine, dearest love. 

And beauty like thine have the angels above; 

Yet men cannot see them, tho’ often they come 
On visits to earth from their heavenly home. 

Thou ne’er wilt behold them ; but if thou wouldst know 
The houses, wherein, when they wander below. 

The angels are fondest of passing their hours. 

I’ll tell thee, fair maiden ; they dwell in the flowers. 

Each flower, as it blossoms, expands to a tent. 

For the house of a visiting angel meant; 

From his flights o’er the earth he may there And repose, 
Tni again to his sky-built pavilion he goes. 

And the angel his resting-place keeps in repair. 

As every good man of his mansion takes care; 


TRANSLATIONS. 


225 


All around he adorns it and colors it well, 

And much he’s delighted within it to dwell. 

True sunshine of gold from the splendor of day 
He borrows, his roof all with hght to inlay ; 

The hues of each season to aid him he calls. 

And stains with the brightest his bedchamber walls. 

The bread angels eat, from the flowers’ finest meal 
He bakes, so that hunger he never can feel; 

He brews from the dew-drops a drink fresh and good, 
And every thing does which a housekeeper should. 

And greatly the flowers as they blossom rejoice. 

That the angel has made them the home of his choice; 
And when from his roamings the angel ascends. 

The flower falls asunder, the stalk do^vnward bends. 

If thou, my dear lady, in truth art inclin’d 
The spirits of paradise near thee to find. 

Give thought to the flowers, and become their true 
lover. 

And angels around thee will constantly hover. 

A flower do but plant near thy window-glass. 

And through it no image of evil can pass; 

When thou goest abroad, on thy breast let appear 
A nosegay, and trust me an angel is near. 

15 


226 


TRANSLATIONS. 


Do but water the lilies at breaking of day, 

Through the hours of the morn thou’lt be fairer than 
they; 

A rose at thy couch for a sentinel keep, 

And angels will rock thee on roses to sleep. 

No sorrowful dreams can approach to thy bed, 

Tor round thee an angel his sentry will spread; 

And whatever visions thy watchman to thee 
Permits to come in, very good ones they’ll be. 

When thus thou art kept by a flower-woven spell, 
Shouldst thou now and then dream that I love thee 
right well, 

Be sure that with fervor and truth I adore thee. 

Or the angel had ne’er set mine image before thee. 


TO A FLOWER. 

Rist. 

That thou bloomest in colors the fairest. 

That the sun paints the garment thou wearest. 
That thou’rt splendid in purple aud gold. 

Can my Rose without envy behold. 

That the bee so often caresses thee. 

That the sick man so gratefully blesses thee. 
And physicians report thou canst heal, 

This my Rose hath no wish to conceal. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


227 


Por in these and in all things beside, 

Her perfection can laugh at thy pride; 
Thou art first of the flowers of the field ; 
All that’s created to Rose must yield. 

Thy fair clothes will -sHther away; 

Thy bright hues—of what use are they ? 
Oft lurks poison thy petals beneath; 

Often thy juices are laden with death. 

What is beauty that never can speak ? 
What are flowers which any may break ? 
What is grace, that can carol no song ? 
Nothing to Rose, to whom hearts belong. 

What makes heaven of earthly hom’s. 
What in beauty surpasses the flowers, 
What with Philomel’s voice may compare, 
Wliat is purer than pearls and more rare. 

What hath friendliness’ winsomest art. 
What by virtue can quicken the heart, 
Wliat hath attractions that never will fade, 
Makes my Rose a faultless maid. 


A SICILIAN SONG. 


Tell me, whither art thou going. 
Where so early, little bee ? 


Meli. 


228 


TRANSLATIONS. 


Still no beam of day is glowing 
On the hills so near to thee. 

Still the dews of night are sparkling 
Every where along the world; 

Heed thee, lest thou injure, darkling. 
Thy bright wings, so fine with gold. 

See, the languid fiowers are sleeping. 
Pillowing ’mid the leaves their heads. 

Softly closed their eyelids keeping, 

Rest upon their downy beds. 

But still onwards thou art flying. 
Onwards still, and far away; 

Tell me, whither art thou hieing. 

Little bee, thus ere the day ? 

Is’t for honey ? Why this fleetness ? 
Shut thy wings and roam no more; 

I will show thee where its sweetness 
Lies in unexhausted store. 

Little wanderer, hast thou never 
Seen my Nice’s beauteous eyes? 

On her lips there’s honey ever; 
Sweetness there for ever lies. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


229 


On the lip of her, the fairest, 

On my lovely maiden’s lip, 

There is honey, purest, rarest, 

Couldst thou there but freely sip. 

PERSIAN PROVERB. 

Heedee. 

The diamond’s a jewel, in earth though it he, 

And dust still is dust, when ’tis blown to the sky. 

FROM THE ARABIC. 

Taabbeta Sheeean. 

Taabbeta Sherran wooed a girl of the family of the 
Absites. And she, desiring to marry him, appointed 
the wedding day—but when he came to her alone, she 
changed her mind and rejected him. Then said he, 
‘‘ What hath changed thee ? ” She answered : “By 
AUah, thy renown is very great, but my family says to 
me, what will you do with a husband, who will be 
killed to-day or to-morrow, and leave you a widow ? ” 
At this he turned away and spake these words :— 

“ Espouse not the chieftain, in conflicts delighting,” 
They called to the maiden I panted to wed; 

“ When next he shall share in the perils of fighting. 
The blade of the sword with his blood shall be fed.” 


230 


TRANSLATIONS. 


Then doubt seized the maiden; she trembled with 
sorrow; 

She feared that the brave one who round him had 
flung 

riie night for a robe, slain in battle to-morrow, 

Would leave her to mourn as a widow while young. 

His passions in slumber but seldom he hushes; 

The wrongs of his sires to avenge is his trade; 

And thirsting for prey like a whuiwind he rushes 
To strike his dark foe, in full armor array’d. 

To cope with his arm strive the young men, who cherish 
A wish for their prowess in war to be known. 

And ennoble their tribe; as beneath him they perish. 
They cannot increase the renown he has won. 

The caves of wild beasts give him shelter till morning; 

The broods of the forest grow used to his ways ; 

And as he goes forth at the light’s early dawning 
They heed not his presence but fearlessly graze. 

They see the young archer who joys not in chases. 

Nor loves ’gainst the beasts the sharp aiTow to send; 
And oh I could they warm to affection’s embraces. 

The hand of affection they’d reach to their friend. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


231 


Oft lies lie in waiting, then suddenly flashes 
With might on the warriors he longs to engage; 
DoAvn, down on his foes from the ambush he dashes, 
And ever will dash, till he’s chilled thro’ with age. 

The masters of camels complain they have found him 
A plague, ever seizing on herds not his o^vn; 

Yet chase him they dare not when comrades are round 
him ; 

And chase him they dare not, e’en when he’s alone. 

He, that clings to his enemy, yields up his breath 
Or sooner or later on places of death ; 

And long should I flourish, well know I, that yet 
Death’s blade, flashing brightly, must one day be met. 


THE MOURNFUL HISTORY OF THE NOBLE WIFE OF 
ASAN AGA. 


Goethe. 


Wliat SO whitely gleams in yonder wood ? 

Is it snow ? or is’t the swan’s white brood ? 
Were it snow, ’twould melt beneath the dav: 
Were it swans, they would have floMii away. 
’Tis not snow, nor swans, that hide the ground; 
Asan Aga’s tents are spread around; 
Languishing of wounds he suffers there; 
Mother, sister, to his couch repair; 


232 


TRANSLATIONS. 


But his cherished wife remains at home; 
Stayed by bashful love, she dares not come. 
Healed his wounds ; yet ere he left his tent, 
To his wife a hard behest he sent; 

“ In my court with mine no longer wait; 
Thou shalt dwell no more within my gate.’’ 


When she heard her husband’s stem commands. 
Smote with grief, the faithful woman stands; 
Sounds of trampling horse anon were heard. 
She foreboded, ‘‘ Asan comes, my lord: ” 
Downward from the tower she runs to leap. 
But her two fair daughters near her weep; 
Crying, Asan’s horses draw not near; 

Comes thy brother Pintorovich here.” 


And to meet her brother she descends; 
Sobbing loudly o’er his neck she bends; 

“ See thy sister’s shame; my lord doth drive 
Prom her home the mother of these five.” 

Silent was her brother; forth he drew. 
Bound in silk of deepest scarlet hue. 

Her divorce, which, written with due care. 
Bids her to her mother’s house repair. 

And dissolves her ancient nuptial vows. 

That she’s free to take another spouse. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


233 


When the lady saw the fell divorce, 

That dissolved her nuptial vows perforce, 
Kissed she first the foreheads of her sons, 
Kissed her daughters’ cheeks, the lovely ones, 
But for grief she cannot turn away 
From the babe that in the cradle lay. 

And her brother bids the mourner speed. 
Swings her lightly on the rapid steed; 

With the trembling lady forth he rode, 
Hastening to his father’s high abode. 

Short the time, not seven days o’er them ran, 
Short the time, and many a princely man 
Woos our lady in her widowed life, 

Woos our lady for his wedded wife. 

Most renowned, Imoski Cadi wooed ; 

Of her brother thus the lady sued ; 

“ I conjure thee, brother, by thy life 
Give me not to be another’s wife. 

For my poor, beloved children’s sake. 

Lest the sight of them my heart should break.” 

But her brother, on her nuptials bent. 

Yields not her pure purpose his consent; 

Yet of prayers the good wife makes no end; 
Brother, at the least, a message send 


234 


TRANSLATIONS. 


And Imoski Cadi thus entreat; 

“ Thee, the mdow doth in friendship greet, 
And with reverence doth she earnest pray, 
Hither when thy bands attend thy way. 
Tell thy train an ample veil to bring. 

That my face beneath it covering, 

Asan’s house concealed I may pass by. 

Nor on my dear orphans cast mine eye.’’ 


Scarce this message had the Cadi read, 
When he calls the horsemen whom he led. 
And to journey towards his bride prepares. 
And the veil she wished for, with him bears. 


Safely to the princess’ house they come; 
Safely turn to gain Imoski’s home ; 

But when Asan’s dwelling they drew nigh, 
Lo ! the children saw the train pass by. 

Saw their mother from above, and call; 

“ Mother, come again to thine own hall; 
With thy children eat the evening meal.”— 
Then did Asan’s spouse deep anguish feel, 
And she prays the prince to give command, 
That awhile his men and horses stand, 

‘‘ Till to my dear little ones I bring 
Each a gift, my latest offering.” 


TRANSLATIONS. 


235 


And they halted at the children’s door; 

Gifts she gave these poor ones from her store; 
Gave the boys fine boots all worked vdth gold ; 
Gave the maidens robes, rich to behold; 

To the babe, that in the cradle lay. 

Gave a small coat for a future day. 

This saw Asan Aga from aside, 

‘‘ Poor dear little ones,” he mournful cried, 

“ Come to me; your mother’s breast is steel, 
Pirmly locked can no compassion feel.” 

Asan’s spouse heard that, could bear no more, 
Pale and trembling sank upon the fioor. 

And her ransomed soul escaped on high. 

When she saw her children from her fiy. 


MY GODDESS. 

Goethe. 

^Who of Heaven’s immortal train 
Shall the highest prize obtain? 

Strife I would with all giv,e o’er. 

But there’s one I’ll aye adore. 

Ever new, and ever changing. 

Through the paths of marv^el ranging. 
Dearest in her father’s eye, 

Jove’s own darling. Fantasy. 


236 


TRANSLATIONS. 


For to her, and her alone, 

All his secret whims are known; 
And in all her faults’ despite 
Is the maid her sire’s delight. 

Oft with aspect mild she goes. 
Decked with lilies and the rose. 
Walks among the flowery lands. 
Summer’s insect swarm commands. 
And for food Avith honeyed lips 
Dew drops from the blossom sips. 

Or with darker mien and hair 
Streaming loose in murky air. 

With the storm she rushes by, 
Whistling, where the crags are high 
And with hues of thousand dyes 
Like the late and early skies. 
Changes and is changed again. 

East as moons, that wax and wane. 

Him, the ancient sire we’ll praise 
Who, as partner of our days. 

Hath to mortal man allied 
Such a fair, unfading bride. 

Eor to us alone she’s given. 

And is bound by bonds of heaven. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


237 


Still to be our faithful bride, 

And though joy, or woe betide. 
Ne’er to wander from our side. 

Other tribes, that have their birth 
From the fruitful, teeming earth. 

All, through narrow life remain 
In dark pleasures, gloomy pain,— 
Live their being’s narrow round. 

To the passing moment bound. 

And unconscious roam and feed. 
Bent beneath the yoke of need. 

But to us with kind intent 
He his frolic daughter sent; 

Nursed with fondest tenderness. 
Welcome her with love’s caress ; 
And take heed, that none but she 
Mistress of the mansion be. 

And of Wisdom’s power beware, 
Lest the old stepmother dare 
Rudely harm the tender fair. 

Yet I know Jove’s elder child. 
Graver, and serenely mild. 

My belov’d, my tranquil friend; 
From me never may she wend ; 


238 


TRANSLATIONS. 


She, that knows with ill to cope, 

And to action urges,—Hope 

THE VIOLET. 

Goethe. 

A violet blossom’d on the green. 

With lowly stem, and bloom unseen; 

It was a sweet, wee flower. 

A shepherd maiden came that way 
With lightsome step and aspect gay. 

Came near, came near. 

Came o’er the green with song. 

Ah! thought the violet, might I be 
The fairest flower on all the lea. 

Ah ! but for one brief hour ; 

And might be plucked by that dear maid. 
And gently on her bosom laid. 

Ah but, ah but, 

A few dear moments long. 

Alas ! the maiden as she passed, 

No eye upon the violet cast; 

She crush’d the poor, wee flower; 

It sank, and dying heaved no sigh. 

And if I die, at least I die 
By her, by her. 

Beneath her feet I die. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


239 


^lan loves of a better existence to dream, 

That may gladden a coming race; 

He sees the bright goal, and its glittering beam 
He follows in restless chase. 

The world may grow old, and grow youthful again. 
But hopes in the future unclouded remain. 

'Tis by hope that man into life is led; 

She flutters round boyhood’s bloom ; 

O’er youth all her brilliant enchantments are spread; 

She sleeps not with age in the tomb ; 

Though life’s weary labors are closed in the grave. 

Still o’er it the branches of hope greenly wave. 

’Tis no vain illusion from folly that came. 

To flatter and cheat the mind. 

That man, as all hearts in their fervor proclaim. 

For a happier world is designed; 

And ne’er will the voices within us deceive 
The reason that hopes, or the souls that believe. 


SONG OF THE CAPTIVE COUNT. 


Goethe. 


Count 

A flower, that’s wondrous fair I know. 
My bosom holds it dear. 


240 


TRANSLATIONS. 


To seek that flower I long to go, 

But am imprison’d here. 

’Tis no light grief oppresses me; 

Bor in the days my steps were free, 

I had it always near. 

Bar round the tower I send mine eye, 
The tower so steep and tall; 

But nowhere can the flower descry 
Brom this high castle wall; 

And him who’ll bring me my desire. 

Or be he knight, or be he squire, 

My dearest friend I’ll call. 

Bose. 

My blossoms near thee I disclose. 
And hear thy wretched plight; 

Thou meanest me, no doubt, the rose. 
Thou noble, hapless knight. 

A lofty mind in thee is seen. 

And in thy bosom reigns the queen 
Of flowers, as is her right. 

Count. 

Thy crimson bud I duly prize 
In outer robe of green; 

Bor this thou’rt dear in maiden’s eyes. 
As gold and jewels’ sheen; 


TRANSLATIONS. 


241 


Thy wreath adorns the fairest brow, 

And yet the flower—^it is not thou, 
Whom my still wishes mean. 

Lily, 

The httle rose has cause for pride, 

And upwards aye will soar; 

Yet am I held by many a bride 
The rose’s wreath before. 

And beats thy bosom faithfully. 

And art thou true, and pure as I, 

Thou’lt prize the lily more. 

Count, 

I call myself both chaste and pure. 

And free from passions low; 

And yet these walls my limbs immure 
In loneliness and woe. 

Though thou dost seem, in white array’d. 
Like many a fair and spotless maid. 

One dearer thing I know. 

Pink, 

And dearer I, the pink, must be. 

And me thou sure dost choose. 

Or else the gardener ne’er for me 

Such watchful care would use; 

A crowd of leaves in circling bloom ! 

And mine through life the sweet perfume. 

And all the thousand hues ! 

16 


242 


TRANSLATIONS. 


Count. 

The pink can no one justly slight, 
The gardener’s favorite flower; 

He sets it now beneath the light, 

Now shields it from its power. 

Yet ’tis not pomp, which o’er the rest 
In splendor shines, can make me blest 
It is a stni small flower. 

Violet. 

I stand concealed, and bending low. 
And do not love to speak; 

Yet will I, as ’tis fitting now. 

My wonted silence break. 

Tor if ’tis I, thou gallant man. 

Thy heart desires, thine, if I can. 

My perfumes all I’ll make. 

Count. 

The violet I esteem indeed. 

So modest and so kind; 

Its fragrance sweet, yet more I need, 
To soothe my anguish’d mind. 

To you the secret I confess; 

Here ’mid this rocky dreariness. 

My love I ne’er shall find. 

The truest wife by yonder brook 
Will roam the mournful day. 

And hither cast the anxious look. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


243 


Long as immured I stay. 

Whene’er she breaks a small blu6 flower, 
And says, Forget me not! the power 
I feel, though far away. 

Yes, e’en though far, I feel its might. 
For true love joins us twain. 

And therefore ’mid the dungeon’s night 
I still in hfe remain. 

And sinks my heart at my hard lot, 

I but exelaim. Forget me not! 

And straight new life regain. 


Where yonder fountain streams. 

What fluttering insect gleams ? 

She changes oft her hues. 

As the chameleons use; 

Now white, now dark she seems; 

Now red, now blue. 

Now blue, now green ; 

How bright must she appear. 

Could I behold her near ! 

The Libellula sings, and flits. 

In circles soars, nor rests her wing.— 

Hist! on the willow now she sits—• 

And now I’ve caught the beauteous thing; 


244 


TRANSLATIONS. 


And gaze;—^but ah! what meets my view ? 
Her briUiant tints a touch destroys, 

And leaves a dark and cheerless blue. 

This is thy fate, anatomist of thy joys. 


THE DIVINE 


Goethb. 


Let man, for highest ends designed. 

Be just in action, generous, kind; 

He differs, by his heavenly birth. 

From all the tribes that roam the earth. 


Hail to the spirits 1 the unknown, 

Sublime, revealed by Faith alone; 

Man, from his own example, learns 
To trust in what no eye discerns. 

Unfeeling nature, ruthless, cold. 

Moves in her orbit, as of old ; 

On just and unjust shines the sun, 

And bright to all, who boldly run 
Through crimes, and them who have no stain, 
Ghmmer the moon and all her train. 


Thunder and hail, the stream, the breeze. 
Rush onward in their course, and seize. 
Resistless, as they haste along. 

One and another—^weak and strong. 


TRANSLATIONS. 


245 


And Portune blindly gropes her way 
Amid the crowd, nor fears to lay 
Her hand upon the guileless boy, 

With curhng locks, (or to destroy 
Or bless, she recks not,) and e’en now 
She smites the aged sinner’s brow. 

That mighty law, whose iron sway 
Is boundless, endless, we obey; 

And, following nature’s changeless wiU, 
Existence’ high designs fulfil. 

And man can do, and man hath done 
The impossible; ’tis he alone 
Continuance can to moments lend, 
Compare and choose the nobler end. 

’Tis he that gives the wise their meed, 

He may avenge the evil deed. 

Heal, save, and to good ends unite 
The wayward force that strays from right. 

And we revere the immortal powers, 

As if their spirits were like ours; 

And they but widely do, what here 
The best have done, in narrower sphere. 

Let man be generous, just, and kind. 
Unwearied do, with willing mind, 


246 


TRANSLATIONS. 


Whatever is useful, pure, and right; 
Thus wiU he leave an image bright 
Of beings, whom our hearts e’en here. 
Forebode, commune with, and revere. 


THE SALUTATION OF A SPIRIT. 

[Goethe illustrates by an allegory the vanity of life. 
The ancient castle stands in its majesty; the heroes, 
who have ruled in it and returned to it in victory, are 
now but shadows; the last survivor of the house is 
just on the point of commencing in his turn the unsuc¬ 
cessful pursuit after glory and happiness, resolved to 
run his course fearlessly and in the spirit of trust.] 

High on the castle’s ancient walls 
The warrior’s shade appears; 

Who to the bark that’s passing calls, 

And thus its passage cheers. 

Behold! these sinews once were strong; 

This heart was firm and bold; 

’Mid war and glory, feast and song. 

My earthly years were told. 

Restless through half of life I ran. 

In half have sought for ease; 

What then ? Thou bark ! that sails with man 
Haste, haste to cleave the seas. 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 

ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 

Time can never efiace the interest of mankind in the 
nation which set the example of intrusting supreme 
power to the people. The democracy of Athens, with 
all the imperfections in every part of its public service, 
with the abuses attending its finances, and the corrup¬ 
tion which finally turned the elective franchise into a 
source of personal revenue, maintains its dignity in the 
eyes of the world; for there the elements of civil liberty 
were first called into action. ^ 

We are not the blind admirers of the Athenian 
commonwealth. No tongue can adequately praise 
many of the results of that State; and it would also 
be difficult fitly to display the deficiencies in its organ¬ 
ization, and the gross injustice of its foreign pohcy. 
Our own confederacy does not more surpass the 
Grecian in the extent of territory over which its 


248 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


liberties are diffused, than in the excellence of the 
details of its laws. It is the genius of our institutions 
to leave every thing to find its natural level, to throw no 
obstacles in the way of the free progress of honest in¬ 
dustry, to melt all the old castes of society into one 
mass, to extend the rights of equal citizenship with 
perfect liberality, and to prevent every thing like a 
privileged order in the State. The Athenian common¬ 
wealth was, on the contrary, eminently artificial in its 
character; it conceded with a chary hand the advan¬ 
tages of citizenship to the strangers resident on its soil. 
The elective franchise was, mainly, an inherited dig¬ 
nity; the government was a species of multitudinous 
aristocracy, where the legislators by birthright, though 
numerous, were limited, and political power was vested 
in the hands of a special body of men, who consumed 
what they did not produce. To this circumstance are to 
be attributed the greatest abuses in ancient Attica. 
The self-same principles in human nature, which in 
England protect the hierarchy and the nobility, pro¬ 
duced in Athens public festivals at the common cost, 
and led the multitude to get their living by enacting 
laws in the assembly, or interpreting them in the halls 
of judicature. 

The student, who attempts to look minutely into 
the secrets of the classic world, is baffled at every effort. 
The accounts are almost always imperfect, sometimes 
contradictory; and the inquirer listens to an echo, that 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


249 


comes but faintly from centuries so remote. Many parts 
of Grecian history are preserved in the most graphic 
sketches, yet the interior of a Grecian State is known 
only in its leading features. The picture is exhibited 
in a dim and wavering light; and can we wonder, that 
so different views have been taken of it ? Is it strange, 
that the scholar has invested Greece with the most 
brilliant colors which imagination can lend ? that the 
glories of Marathon and Plataeae have shed a lustre over 
centuries, when patriotism was nearly extinct? The 
mind has been so filled with the productions of Grecian 
art, that attention has been diverted from ordinary 
concerns. 

The admirable work of the learned Boeckh on the 
Public Economy of the Athenians illustrates the pecu¬ 
liar excellence of the Germans in critical researches. It 
contains not a word of vague declamation from be¬ 
ginning to end. No topic is avoided because it is 
difficult, nor neglected because it is minute. Instead 
of theories we have a series of facts, selected from the 
whole circle of classic literature. Almost every surviv¬ 
ing author is made to contribute some instruction; the 
orators most of all. Nothing seems to have escaped the 
patient labors of this distinguished Hellenist. Every 
passage,, from which an inference could be wrung, is 
made the subject of his consideration; and in this way 
he has succeeded in illustrating the employments of 
every-day life in the best days of Athens. His investiga- 


250 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


tions have never been baffled except by the want of suffl- 
' cient materials. He has done all that was possible; 
but to represent life as it was in the happiest age of 
the city of Minerva, imagination has yet to fill up the 
outline; and the jests of the comic writers, and the 
anecdotes of the lovers of marvels, though fruitful 
sources of inference, tempt curiosity without fully 
satisfying it. 

A reference to Attica recalls all our classic asso¬ 
ciations, and concentres them 

“ Where on the ^gean shore a city stands. 

Built nobly ; pure the air, and light the soil; 
Athens, the eye of Greece, mother of arts 
And eloquence.’’ 

It would seem as if there the passion for gain had 
been lost in the strife for glory; as though no avarice 
but that of praise had been domesticated. Who asks, 
out of what fund the Parthenon was built ? or inquires 
into the cost of its sculptures ? or is curious to know 
the income of Socrates, and at what rates of interest 
his little patrimony may have been lent ? Who wishes 
to ascertain how much would have constituted an inde¬ 
pendent fortune in the days of Lycurgus, the Athenian 
financier? who demands if the Athenians practised 
free trade ? 

And yet in Athens, commerce was active; manu¬ 
factures were not neglected; houses were built to let; 
there were no joint-stock companies, yet insurance was 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


251 


not unknown; there were no banks of circulation, yet 
money-lenders abounded. PoUowing the guidance of 
Boeckh, we intend to enter into some homely state¬ 
ments respecting life and business at Athens, such as 
can neither kindle the imagination nor refine the taste, 
but may yet throw hght on an important chapter in 
the history of the human race. Contentment with 
our own pohtical condition will certainly be increased 
by a near contemplation of the free States of antiquity. 

THE SUPPLY OF GOLD AND SILVER. 

The ancients did not make a separate science of 
political economy. Their treatises upon pohtics touch 
upon it but incidentally; and therefore information on 
the condition of their finances must be gathered piece¬ 
meal, and by inductions. 

The resources of Athens in its earlier days can 
scarcely merit attention ; and after the loss of its inde¬ 
pendence, the inquiry would be less productive of 
interest or instruction. Our discussion will chiefly 
have reference to the time following the Persian wars, 
and before the aggrandizement of Alexander. 

In the early period of Grecian history, the quantity 
of the precious metals increased very slowly. But 
between the age of Solon and Demosthenes, such a 
change was wrought by the nearer connection with 
the East, that prices were affected in the proportion of 


252 


STUDIES IN HISTOEY. 


one to five; a change rapid beyond any thing m 
modern history. In the days of Croesus gold could 
hardly be purchased any where in Hellas. It was 
more abundant in Africa and especially in Asia, where 
the sands of Colchis, and the streams of Pactolus 
glittered with treasure. The fable surrounded Midas 
with nothing else; and history keeps the record of the 
anaiable liberality as weU as the hoarded treasures, and 
pious offerings of Croesus ? The master of Celsenae, a 
town near the sources of the Maeander, himself pos¬ 
sessed about fifteen millions of dollars in gold. The 
booty of Cyrus in Asia Minor was incalculably great. 
The revenues of Darius, after defraying aU the expenses 
of the provinces and their satraps, amounted annually 
to $12,191,400. India was ever famous for its wealth 
in valuable ores; and the tale of busy ants, that dug 
for gold, is an allegory on the productiveness of her 
mines. 

The circulating medium did not increase in propor¬ 
tion with the quantity of bullion. The temples and 
the public coffers were provided by a prudent super¬ 
stition or a grasping despotism with immense treasures 
in the precious metals, either in massive bars, or 
formed into works of art. The coinage was limited 
by the seeming wants of commerce. Even in Greece 
immense sums lay in deposit. The citadel of Athens 
had a Strong box with 87,300 dollars in cash, besides 
many vessels of silver and gold. The treasures of 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


253 


Delplii are notorious. The gifts of Croesus alone 
amounted to not less than $3,600,000. The wealth 
of the consecrated national isle increased with the na¬ 
tional victories. The Persian king entered on the 
invasion of Greece with one thousand two hundred 
camels laden with money and precious things; aU of 
which became the prey of the victors. ^Vhen the 
Phocians, of a later age, laid sacrilegious hands on the 
treasures of Delphi, they coined from them about 
$9,000,000 in value. 

The currency of Greece received farther additions 
from the system of bribery practised by Philip; but 
after the conquest of Asia by Alexander, coin flowed 
in upon Europe in stiU broader channels. The trea¬ 
sures which he found collected in the Persian empire 
were very considerable. The amount taken at Susa 
and Persis was $45,000,000, at Pasargada $5,400,000, 
and at Persepohs $108,000,000. The sum amassed 
at Ecbatana, is said by Strabo, no contemptible au¬ 
thority, to have amounted to $162,000,000. 

Alexander’s liberality corresponded with this im¬ 
mense wealth. The expenses of his table were $1,500 
daily ; and he paid the debts of his soldiers, amounting 
to about $8,883,000. The funeral ceremonies of 
Hephaestion are said to have cost $10,800,000. The 
grateful monarch deemed $720,000 no unreasonable 
appropriation to further the investigations of Aristotle 
in Natural History; and it was an offer of $900,000 


254 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


which Phocion refused. His yearly revenue from Asia 
was $27,000,000; and he left a treasure of no more 
than $45,000,000. 

His satraps must have been very rich. Harpalu^, 
who fled to Athens, was estimated to have amassed 
$4,500,000, though he declared in Greece, that he had 
but $674,000. 

The wealth of the successors of Alexander was 
equally extraordinary. A single festival of the Ptol¬ 
emies cost $2,000,000; and, at the lowest computa¬ 
tion, the treasure left by Ptolemy Philadelphus amount¬ 
ed to the enormous sum of $166,000,000. Some 
estimate it four times as high. It is difficult to believe 
the account, but not impossible. Egypt was at that 
time the richest country in the world; and had almost 
a monopoly of the commerce with the East. Nor is it 
half so strange, as that the debt of a modern nation 
should have grown to be four thousand millions of 
dollars. The revenue from the customs in Egypt was 
$13,000,000 annually. The annual taxes in Coelo- 
Syria, Phenicia, Judea, and Samaria, were farmed out 
for more than $14,000,000. 

The precious metals existed in very great abun¬ 
dance in the Levant, but the custom of collecting great 
masses of these treasures, tended to prevent the pro¬ 
portionate increase of the circulating medium. So 
many temples, so many cities, so many provincial 
satraps, so many despotic princes withdrew the coin 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


255 


from circulation to reserve it in deposits, that prices 
were not reduced in the degree which we might have 
inferred from the mention of such enormous sums. 
Great quantities also existed in the shape of works of 
art; and the shrines of many a Grecian Deity were 
adorned with images and costly vessels wrought out of 
“ barbaric gold.” 

The amount of the coinage of Athens has been 
variously estimated. The basis of calculation is the 
weight of such pieces of money as have been preserved. 
We find that as near an approximation as we can 
make, gives fifteen cents for the drachma, and of course 
for the mina $15, and $900 for the talent. This is the 
basis which we follow. It is a httle more than the one 
usually given in English books; yet a little below the 
calculations of Barthelemy. An oholus is of course 
taken to be two cents and a half. 

The Greeks reckoned according to drachmas; as 
the Erench according to francs. The usual idea has 
been, as to the difference between ancient and modem 
prices, that one dollar was worth in the best days of 
Athens what ten dollars are now. Boeckh makes the 
difference no greater than as one to three. We think 
that he has not reduced it unreasonably. If prices at 
modem Athens or at Naples are compared with the 
statement which we shall presently give, the view of 
the distinguished Hellenist will probably be confirmed. 

The Athenian coinage, to which we have alluded. 


256 


STUDIES IN HISTOEY. 


was the one established by Solon. Before his time the 
drachma was worth more. Out of seventy-two and a 
half drachmas of the old coin, he made one hundred. 
In this change, creditors as well as debtors acquiesced. 

The value of gold, as compared with silver, varied 
with times and places. It was usually considered to be 
as ten to one. In the time of Plato, it was as twelve to 
one; Herodotus says as thirteen to one. In the Bospho¬ 
rus, in the age of Demosthenes, it was as fourteen to one. 
Among the Homans, in the year 564 of Home, that is, 
190 years before Christ, one third of a sum of money 
paid by the H^tolians was taken in gold, at the rate of 
one for ten, to the grievance of the ^tohans. Under 
Caesar, the gold from Gaul reduced the rate so that it 
became as one to eight and thirteen-fourteenths; while 
in the fifth century of the Christian era, it was as high 
as one to eighteen. 

The price of gold advanced in Greece vdth the 
progress of business. It was much used in making 
remittances. Soldiers were paid in it; and Sparta 
hoarded it in vast sums, never to be expended but for 
warlike purposes. 

Gold coin was early in use. Croesus coined the 
golden stater. Darius, the son of Hystaspis, coined 
darics of pure gold, equal in weight to thirty cents in 
silver, and current for three dollars. Pive therefore 
made a mina; three hundred a talent. The golden 
darics were favorite coins in Hellas. 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


257 


Some of the Grecian States had a debased coinage 
for domestic circulation. Even the Athenians once en¬ 
gaged in that dishonest process, but it was soon put 
down by pubhc opinion; and the coin of Athens main¬ 
tained in commerce a high character for intrinsic value. 


BUSINESS IN ATHENS. 

The nearest approximation we have been able to 
make to the contents of Attica, would allow to that 
country, including Salamis and Helena, no more than 
from 640 to 656 square geographical miles. The an¬ 
cients called Athens the most populous city of Greece. 
Its inhabitants were composed of three separate 
classes; citizens, resident strangers, and slaves. Of 
the former, the average number was 20,000. Allowing 
the proportion of 4 J to include the women and minors, 
we shall have 90,000 as the number of the free native 
inhabitants of Attica. A similar mode of calculation 
gives 45,000 for the number of free strangers, whom 
business or pleasure had domicihated. The census 
taken by Demetrius gives 400,000 slaves. If we 
consider this estimate as excessive, the number of slaves 
may stiU have been 365,000. Thus 90,000 citizens, 
45,000 sojourners, and 365,000 slaves, in all 500,000 
souls, may have occupied the soil of Attica. 

The free population was to the slave about as one 
to four. The surprising disproportion between the 
17 


258 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


free and the slave population is corroborated by 
circumstantial as well as direct evidence. Every 
body was served by slaves; even the poorer citizen 
owned some miserable drudge. The manufactories 
were supphed by them; the rich had throngs of 
attendants; some philosophers were not content with 
less than ten. The father of Demosthenes employed 
more than fifty in his business, beside the female 
slaves of his household. Plato says, that rich men 
often had fifty slaves. 

This immense number of slaves left the free citi¬ 
zens of Attica no occupation but politics. They were 
hterally crowded out of every other pursuit. Thus the 
Athenians lived either on the revenues derived from 
their possessions, or by serving in the courts and 
popular assemblies, or by pursuing some of those 
nobler arts, whieh genius exercised, and the popular 
pride cultivated and gratified. 

Athens had 10,000 houses. Eourteen souls to a 
house would seem too large an allowance; and yet 
many of the houses were built on purpose to be occu¬ 
pied by several families. The mining distriet was also 
very populous. The harbor of the Piraeeus was likewise 
crowded with tenements. Allow then for the mining 
district 20,000, for the city 140,000, for the harbor 
40,000, and we shall have left for the country 300,000 
souls; or about 500 to the square geographical mile. 
The number seems ineredibly large; it is stiU more 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


259 


difficult to disbelieve the estimate. We must remem¬ 
ber, that Attica was the head of a number of States, 
the mistress of the sea, and the territory in which 
wealth, manufactures and business were concentrated. 

Its soil was not unproductive. The mild climate 
ripened aU excellent fruits; the arts of agriculture 
were greatly advanced; the oil of Attica is famous even 
to this day; and its classic hills, of which every peak 
has been the haunt of a god, or the theme of a poet, 
are still crowned with rows of olives; 

‘‘ And still his honeyed wealth Hymettus yields.” 
Attica did not abound in horses. At the battle of 
Marathon there was no cavalry. The fisheries were 
good ; the mines of silver productive; the quarries of 
marble, which still gleam in the glare of the bright 
day, even then constituted an important article of 
export. 

The mechanic arts were originally in low repute. 
None of the ancient nobihty were willmg to engage in 
them; but the mechanics afterwards gained great 
power in the commonwealth, and Cleon the tanner 
was among the favored successors of Pericles. Yet 
manufactures were liberally encouraged. Freedom of 
competition was permitted; strangers thronged to 
Attica to engage in business, and their industry fur¬ 
nished a large amount of exports. Prices were kept 
up by the great foreign demand, and the high rates 
of interest exacted by the capitalist rendered large 


260 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


profits necessary. Great quantities of arms, various 
kinds of cutlery, and cloths were exported. 

Attica was thus enabled to procure from abroad 
the products which her own soil could not furnish in 
sufficient abundance. No law prohibited the exporta¬ 
tion of specie. On the contrary, the purity of the 
Attic coinage often made its export advantageous; 
the want of bills of exchange frequently rendered it 
necessary. In the Pirgeeus, as in the harbor of our ovm 
splendid commercial emporium, the produce of every 
clime was to be found. The dominion of the sea, says 
Xenophon, secured to the Athenians the sweets of the 
world. Nor would the Athenian ships in point of size 
have suffered from a comparison with the New York 
packets. Demosthenes speaks of one, which carried 
three hundred men, besides its cargo, slaves, and com¬ 
plement of sailors. 

That honorable employment, which has such an 
absorbing charm to the lovers of intelligence,—^that 
trade, which is emphatically the trade, did not 
flourish of yore in the city of Minerva. There was 
indeed a book-maker in Athens; and books were ex¬ 
ported even across the Euxine; but they were chiefly 
blank books; the day of glory did not dawn on the 
trade till the reign of Augustus. The sale of manu¬ 
scripts for profit was so uncommon in the time of 
Plato, that Hermodorus of Sicily, the oldest bookseller 
of whom we read, and who sold the writings of his 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


261 


illustrious contemporary, came to be a proverb. In the 
youth of Zeno, however, there were some incipient 
estabhshments for vending books in Athens. 

The credit system, so important in modem com¬ 
merce, was but partially understood by the ancients. 
Hence there were none of those commotions and pres¬ 
sures in the money-market, to which our cities are ex¬ 
posed. The indorser was bound for a year. The laws 
for collecting debts were very rigid; and the rights of 
capitalists were guarded with great strictness. The 
rich were taxed, and taxed heavily; but they were 
well protected. One class of frauds on the creditor 
was punished with death. When money was lent, and 
the proceeds of a voyage pledged as collateral security, 
if the debtor secretly disposed of them to the injury 
of his creditor, life was forfeited. 

Commerce was suspended, or was at least inactive 
in the winter season. That, therefore, was the time for 
the sessions of the court which had maritime jurisdic¬ 
tion. If a cause was not brought to an issue, it lay 
over to the next winter. But at a later time, the law 
assigned a month as the period within which an action 
was required to be decided. 

Commercial agents or consuls were not unknown. 
The Athenians hardly had a systematized tariff; or 
rather, their position was such as to render the adop¬ 
tion of a protecting system wholly useless. The chief 
commercial regulations related to the importation of 


262 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


corn; of which great supphes were annually required 
from abroad. There also occurred cases, where the 
sale of a monopoly was made an expedient for obtain¬ 
ing revenue. But if Athens had no prohibitory duties, 
because the first manufacturing district could defy 
competition, it was not so with her neighbors, ^gina 
and Argos both became jealous of the wealth of Athens, 
and the introduction of Attic manufactures was pro¬ 
hibited by their laws. 

The dominion of the sea was converted by Athens 
into a despotism. She understood, no less than 
modern England, the dismal doctrines of blockade; 
and submission was almost the only security for a 
commercial city. If a ship hoisted an independent 
flag, it was sure to be pillaged by the Athenian 
corsairs. Her maritime courts were as ready as ever 
were those of the English to sustain the claim of the 
privateer; and it was equally difficult to get a decree 
reversed, after a ship had been once condemned. 

In the domestic market, the retail-trade was open 
to all citizens ; foreigners .might also come into compe¬ 
tition; though a tax, or caution-money, was exacted 
of them. 

The gains of mercantile operations were far greater 
than at present. Yet it was unusual for a ship to 
return with its capital doubled; a result not at aU un¬ 
common in the early stages of our own repubhc. A 
Samian ship, which made for its owners a gain of 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


263 


$54,000 in one voyage, was considered by Herodotus 
something so extraordinary, that he has embalmed the 
memory of it. 


PRICES. 

The fertility of the southern regions and the diffi¬ 
culty attending the exports to remote nations, re¬ 
duced the price of many commodities of easy produc¬ 
tion. Athens was a city, in which hving was regarded 
as expensive. We shall give some data in confir¬ 
mation of this opinion. But the low cost of some 
articles, as compared with present prices, is often 
to be attributed to a change in the state of the 
markets, as much as to a change in the value of 
money. 

The nearest possible approximation gives thirty 
dollars as the average price of an acre of good land 
in Attica. In this computation, we allow four jplethra 
to the acre; which is nearly exact. Yet landed estates 
were small and were greatly subdivided. Alcibiades 
inherited no more than seventy acres; and Phaenippus, 
who owned three hundred and sixty, was esteemed an 
immense landholder. 

In consequence of the great extent of Athens, all 
the land was not occupied. The houses were un¬ 
sightly ; the streets narrow and crooked; and the 
Pirseeus was the only regularly built part of the city. 


264 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


The upper stories often overhung the street; and stair¬ 
cases were generally on the outside. Private houses 
were often built of unburnt brick. The whole expense 
of building was inconsiderable. The prices of houses 
varied from forty-five dollars to one thousand eight 
hundred, according to their size, situation, and quality. 
The latter price was unusually high; half the sum 
would purchase a very decent dweUing-house. 

An able-bodied slave, not possessed of peculiar 
skill, was worth not far from twenty dollars. The 
price varied, according to his health and age, from 
seven to thirty dollars. This proves how absurd, to say 
nothing of its immorality, is the use of slave-labor in a 
temperate clime. The labor of the slave would, as the 
price proves, yield but little beyond his own support. 
Yet a good mechanic was worth much more. The 
better slaves, employed by the father of Demosthenes 
in the manufacture of swords, were worth on an 
average about seventy-five dollars; and that sum was 
no unusual price for a skilful workman. The divi¬ 
dends on the establishment of Demosthenes amounted 
to a little less than sixteen per cent, annually; but 
another branch of his business yielded him an annual 
profit of thirty per cent. 

A good horse was worth about forty-five dollars; 
but a handsome saddle, or carriage horse, would very 
readily command one hundred and eighty dollars. Yet 
who can set a limit to luxury in horses ? It may be 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


265 


said of human nature, as of youth, gaudet equis. 
Bucephalus brought nearly twelve thousand dollars. 
The price of a pair of mules was from eighty to a 
hundred and twenty dollars. In the good days of 
Solon, before the precious metals were plenty, the pious 
devotee could purchase an ox for the altar with sev¬ 
enty-five cents. But when Athens had grown rich, 
the best beeves sold for seven and a half or even eleven 
and a half dollars. A hecatomb cost, in one instance, 
seven hundred and sixty-seven dollars; in another, 
eleven thousand and fifty-eight dollars. It is men¬ 
tioned as one of the expensive fooleries of Alci- 
biades, that he gave one thousand and fifty dollars for 
a dog. 

The com laws involve a great question in the 
politics of Athens. Attica was by no means able to 
supply its own demands for domestic consumption. 
The residue was received partly from the Thracian 
Chersonesus, partly from Pontus. Hence we see how 
important was the possession of Byzantium to Athens. 
There is reason to beheve, that the annual importation 
of bread-stufis equalled one and a half million of 
bushels. No com was allowed to be exported; no 
ship laden with it could touch at an Attic port, with¬ 
out selling at least two thirds of its cargo. The laws 
threw hindrances in the way of buying up all that was 
in the market; the quantity which might be purchased 
at once was hmited, and the retailer was restricted to a 


266 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


profit of less than two cents on a bushel. All attempts 
to forestall and monopolize were prohibited, under the 
penalty of death. Yet the oppression of the corn 
merchants was very great, in spite of the severity 
of the laws, or perhaps in consequence of them. 

As to prices, under Solon a bushel of wheat was 
worth ten cents; from 390 to 380 years before Christ, 
about thirty cents; in the age of Demosthenes, half a 
dollar was esteemed a moderate demand. 

The bakers of Athens carried their art to a high 
degree of perfection; but we have no direct criterion 
to decide how much the good housekeepers of classic 
name were obliged to pay for their loaves. The price 
of corn furnishes some means of judging; the dispro¬ 
portion, however, between the price of wheat and of 
bread must have been greater than at present, in con¬ 
sequence of the high rates of interest. 

The metretres of wine held about thirty-five quarts, 
or (to state its contents exactly) 35 1452-10,000 
quarts. The low price of wine in the ancient world is 
astonishing. That produced in Attica, sold for less than 
two cents a quart; and very tolerable wine was often 
sold for half that sum. This proves, also, that in the 
main the Athenians were not an intemperate race. The 
Chian wine was worth forty-five cents a quart. In 
upper Italy when a bushel of wheat brought ten cents, 
a gallon of wine cost less than one. 

Sweet oil was worth a httle more than sixty cents 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


267 


a gallon. Salt was easily imported into Athens; it 
was also manufactured. Of its price nothing is 
known. Timber for building was imported; but coals 
and firewood were sent into the city on asses. Thirty 
cents were asked for the quantity which an ass would 
carry. 

The style of hving was as unequal as were the 
degrees of wealth and extravagance. Alexander’s 
table cost for himself and his suite $1,500 daily, 
and the miser in Theophrastus allowed his wife but 
nine mills. The term ojpson embraced every thing but 
bread; and seven or eight cents were considered a 
small provision for it. Yet a slave in Terence buys a 
meal for his old master for two and a half cents; and 
the lawyer Lysias complains of the guardian, who 
charged for the opson of two boys and a httle girl, the 
extravagant sum of a New York shilling. The Athe¬ 
nians were very fond of fish; and a great deal of salt- 
fish was imported from Pontus and even from Cadiz. 

The ancient world was ruled by the same human na¬ 
ture as the modem. The Wellington boots of modem 
day remind us of the Alcibiades boots, and the Iphi- 
crates shoes of antiquity. A good cloak might cost one 
doUar and eighty cents ; and a dandy was willing to 
give three dollars for a coat; evidently, however, from a 
fashionable tailor. A good pair of woman’s shoes cost 
no more than thirty cents. A very showy pair of 
men’s shoes may have cost one dollar and twenty cents. 


268 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


Ointments were exceedingly expensive. The more 
precious kinds brought from fifty dollars to one hun¬ 
dred for the gill. 

There are no sufficient data on which to estimate 
the cost of a ship. As to productiveness, we find that 
the corn ship, Isis, of immense burden, yielded annu¬ 
ally for freight, $10,800. 

The amount necessary for the maintenance of a 
family, is not easily established. Socrates is supposed 
to have lived upon an income of seventy-five dollars; 
but then, his manner of living was inferior to that of 
the slaves. His coat was old and shabby, and he wore 
the same garment both winter and summer ; he went 
barefoot; his chief food was bread and water; and as 
he engaged in no kind of business to mend his estate 
or increase his income, it is not wonderful that his wife 
scolded often. Demosthenes, his sister, and their 
mother, paid for their board $105 for a year; and 
provided the house into the bargain. A young man, 
Mantitheus, could be educated and supported for $108 
annually. The accounts furnish no means of arriving 
at a definite conclusion. Who would limit at the pres¬ 
ent day the sum with which it is possible to preserve 
hfe? 

Death brought heavy expenses in its train. The 
income of years was lavished upon the expenses of a 
funeral; which amounted to a sum varying from $45 
to $1800. 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


269 


The working classes received but moderate compen¬ 
sation. The great number of slaves, who came into 
competition for labor, reduced the price exceedingly. 
Mere manual labor could be procured for ten cents a 
day; that seems to have been the lowest rate, and is 
not lower than the present price of labor in many parts 
of Europe. 

The fares in travelling were very small. From iEgina 
to the Pirseeus, a distance of sixteen miles, the fare was 
but five cents. Prom Egypt to Pontus, not more than 
thirty cents. This price is inexphcably low. A soldier 
in the infantry received for pay and rations for himself 
and attendant, thirty cents daily; the officers twice, 
and the generals only four times as much. Here is a 
great contrast with modern usage. 

Public physicians were sometimes appointed. Hip¬ 
pocrates is said to have received a stipend from Athens, 
and to have been physician to the State. Democedes 
in the 60th Olympiad, about 538 years before Christ, 
received at iEgina $900. He was invited to Athens 
with a salary of $1,500; but Polycrates of Samos se¬ 
cured him for $1,800. In those days money was stiU 
scarce. 

The stars at the theatres received enormous com¬ 
pensation. The highest sum mentioned, is $900 for 
two days; which would nearly satisfy our most popu¬ 
lar players. 

Protagoras, the Abderite, began teaching for mo- 


270 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


ney. He demanded for a complete course, $1,500. 
Gorgias required as much, yet died poor. Some, find¬ 
ing the charges high, used to cheapen the wisdom of 
the philosopher; just as now, copyrights are a sub¬ 
ject of discussion. But competition reduced prices. 
Evenus asked only $150, in the age of Socrates ; and 
at the same price, Isocrates taught the whole art 
of rhetoric. Prodicus used to sell tickets for separate 
lectures. 

One per cent, a month, was the usual rate of inter¬ 
est ; yet there was no legal restriction of usury. The 
trade in money, hke every thing else, was left wholly 
free, and the rates varied from ten to thirty-six per 
cent. In cases of bottomry, this last rate was the 
highest. It is plain, that insurance was in such cases 
paid for, not less than the use of capital. The high 
rates may be ascribed to the insecurity of the times; 
imperfect legislation; the difficulty of pursuing a claim 
in a foreign state; and the faulty administration of 
justice. 

The brokers made their gain partly by exchanging 
coin at a premium, but far more by receiving deposits 
and lending them again at a higher rate than they 
themselves agreed to pay. Some of them' enjoyed the 
best credit, and received money and notes on deposit. 
Pasion, at once a banker and a broker, used to make a 
clear profit of $1,500 annually. Bankruptcies among 
the brokers, were not unknown. 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


271 


Imprisonment for debt was not allowed. The 
code of Solon, five hundred years before Christ, ter¬ 
minated at Athens that mortgaging of the body which 
has so long deformed the codes of modem States. 

It seems doubtful, whether investments in real 
estate were profitable ones. In the cases of which 
accounts are preserved, the returns seem not to have 
exceeded eight or nine per cent. Yet the number of 
those who lived in hired houses, was hardly less than 
45,000, vdth a proportionate niunber of slaves. 


PUBLIC EXPENSES. 

Before the movement in favor of constitutional lib¬ 
erty, modem revolutions were often the result of finan¬ 
cial difficulties. In a democracy, no distinction can 
possibly exist between the interests of the government 
and the people; we find accordingly, in the ancient 
republics, that fiscal embarrassments were not the 
causes of civil commotions. Money was as highly 
valued, and the expenses of Athens were proportionally 
as great, as in modem governments; but the an- 
* cients had no public debt. They were often in distress 
for funds ; but violent remedies were applied ; and the 
oppression did not remain as a permanent and increas¬ 
ing burden on succeeding generations. 

After the system of oppressing the allies was de¬ 
veloped, money became the chief lever in pubhc affairs; 


272 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


and the decline of the State was at hand. Yet pride 
of character, ambition, and the hope of plunder after 
victory, still preserved the spirit of enterprise. The 
true pohcy of a popular State should be, to diminish 
the public expenses ; in Athens on the contrary, to the 
great detriment of the people, new wants were contin¬ 
ually invented; new sources of prodigal expenditure 
were devised; and the finances constantly increased in 
political importance. 

A regular annual estimate of the public revenue 
and expenditure seems never to have been made in 
Athens, nor to have been customary in antiquity. The 
usual expenses were for public buildings, public 
festivals, distributions and wages to the people for 
legislative and judicial services, pay of the troops, 
poor-rates, pubhc rewards, purchases of arms, ships 
and cavalry horses. The extraordinary expenses in 
wars cannot be estimated. 

The public buildings of Athens were, as all the 
world knows, numerous, vcostly, and splendid. The 
most opulent monarchs, the haughtiest princes, have 
not been able to equal what the energies of the 
Athenian multitude called into existence. The Ro¬ 
mans could do no more than imitate; and when re¬ 
cently Prussia desired that the principal entrance into 
its royal city might be worthy of the pride of a rising 
power, its artists could propose nothing better than to 
reproduce the Propylsea of Athens. The dockyard of 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


273 


Athens alone cost $900,000. The fortifications were 
on a gigantic scale. The city and its harbors were 
protected by walls sixty feet five inches high, and broad 
enough for two wagons to pass conveniently; of faced 
stone, bound by iron bolts. The city and the harbor 
were connected by walls, one side of which measured 
more than four and a half, the other nearly four, miles. 
These were originally very expensive, and constantly 
required large expenditures for repairs. The Propylaea 
cost five years’ labor, and $1,810,800 in money. Add 
to these the Odeon, the hippodromes, the aqueducts, 
the fountains, the pubhc baths, the ornaments of the 
citadel, the temples of Victory, of Neptune, of Minerva, 
aU adorned with the costliest works of art, the pave¬ 
ments of the streets, the pubhc road to Eleusis, the 
numerous altars, which pious superstition prodigally 
erected and endowed; and it Tvill be evident, that a 
State of but half a miUion of souls must have practised 
self-denial for the sake of public magnificence. Time 
and the violence of man have* indeed swept away most 
of these visible representations of the power, piety, taste, 
and luxury of the Attic democracy. Yet the ruins, 
which remain, are the admiration of aU beholders. 
A few weather-beaten statues, a few mangled and 
broken bas-reliefs, tom from Athens, now constitute 
the chief wealth in sculpture, which the British empire 
contains. Let two thousand years of adversity pass 
over the decline of London, and what monuments 
18 


274 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


would survive to tell the future inquirers, that it had 
been the wealthiest metropohs of this age, and had 
claimed the first rank also for intelligence as well as 
for thrift ? Except St. Paul’s (which has not the stamp 
of eternity upon it like the Parthenon), and the Water¬ 
loo bridge, there is nothing which would bid defiance 
to time, and bear testimony, to the latest generation, of 
the grandeur of British power. The chief city of the 
little democracy of Attica contained within its precincts 
far more of those works of genius which elevate the 
soul above the ordinary details of life, and quicken the 
imagination. 

The police of Athens seems to have been limited to 
a patrol of armed watchmen, whose duty it was to pre¬ 
serve tranquillity in the streets, and to afibrd protection 
to persons and property. 

The festivals were a great source of extravagance. 
The Athenians, in the early days of the repubhc, sacri¬ 
ficed liberally, to display their reverence for the gods; 
afterwards prodigally, that the people might riot on the 
offerings. In the splendor and in the number of her 
festivals, Athens surpassed all other Grecian States. 
The poets were invited to produce their magnificent 
dramas; tragedy was evoked with, its splendid pall and 
its recollections of the days of demigods; the youthful 
beauty of the city appeared in the choirs; music lent 
its attractions to heighten the vivid interest of the 
stage; and splendid processions, with their glittering 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


275 


pageantry and solemn trains, assisted in filling up a 
holiday with spectacles that might attract and astonish 
the rest of Greece. ‘‘ You never postpone your festi¬ 
vals,” says Demosthenes, “and you lavish on them 
larger sums than you expend for the naval service; 
but your fleets always arrive too late.” “ Count the 
cost of their tragedies,” says Plutarch, “ you will find 
that their (E dipuses, and Antigones, and Medeas, and 
Electras, cost more than their wars for supremacy with 
the other Greeks, and their struggles for freedom 
against the barbarians.” 

But a still greater expense grew out of the direct 
distribution of money to the people. The tribute, levied 
from the allies, was divided among the poorer citizens, 
whole talents at a time. Confiscated estates were 
their plunder. The poor helped themselves out of the 
public chest, and sometimes dined and always went to 
the theatres at the cost of the State. 

We pay our legislators, courts, and justices; the 
ancient Athenians went further; they paid themselves 
for attending town meetings. The whole number of 
voters may have been twenty thousand, of whom the 
majority managed all public affairs, but the rich and 
the busy did not usually make their appearance in the 
assemblies, where they were sure of being voted do^vn; 
the needy never failed. In this way, the adminis¬ 
tration of Athenian affairs fell to some six or eight 
thousand very poor men. Masters of the public 


276 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


treasury, and of the power of levying taxes, they 
voted to themselves what sums they could; till at 
last they came to consider pohtics their trade, and 
deemed it but fair that they should be compensated for 
participating in legislation. As there was no represen¬ 
tation, and business was conducted as in our town 
meetings, the plausible idea of paying for legislation 
opened the way to a support for every citizen; the rich 
naturally dechned the service as well as its emoluments, 
and the poor citizens though very numerous, yet stiU 
limited in comparison with the whole population of 
Athens, obtained a monopoly of legislation and its 
wages. Seven and a half cents was the liberal compen¬ 
sation which an Athenian citizen received for acting in 
the supreme legislature of the State. We have reason 
to suppose that 8,000 usually attended, so that each 
Athenian town-meeting cost the State $600. There 
were forty regular meetings in the year; the annual 
charge was therefore $24,000. 

The Council of Tive Hundred were paid fifteen 
cents for every day of actual service. We see in 
this the views of the Athenians in regard to the 
compensation of public officers. They allowed them 
but little more than the wages of a laborer. The rela¬ 
tive value of money we have stated to be as three to 
one. Our House of Representatives would be as well 
paid as the Athenian senate, if their pay were fixed at 
forty-five cents a day. This may appear strange; but 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


277 


it is in conformity with the Grecian policy. The com- 
mander-in-chief of an army received, as we have seen, 
but four times the wages of a private. High salaries 
are not at all classic. 

Athens was the great shire-town, in which all the 
courts of Attica were held, and where the causes of the 
allies also were tried. There was more law business 
done at Athens, than in all Greece besides. Nearly 
one third of the whole number of citizens sat daily, as 
judges, except on such days as were appropriated to 
religion, or to general assemblies. Hence it was, that 
Athens swarmed with half-bred lawyers, pettifoggers, 
quarrelsome, litigious sophists. The daily pay of a 
judge was seven and a half cents. Every one, on en¬ 
tering, received a ticket and a judge’s staff. 'When 
the day’s work was done, he returned the ticket and 
took his emolument. There were ten courts, each 
composed of five hundred, and one regularly in session. 
Mention is also made of larger courts, composed of ten, 
fifteen, and even twenty hundred. Allomng 6,000 as 
the average daily number of judges in Athens, they 
must have cost the State $135,000 annually. 

The public orators, advocates, and lawyers, em¬ 
ployed by the people, were ten in number. Their fee, 
like that of the senators, was fifteen cents for each day’s 
service. Ambassadors were paid with equal frugality; 
their travelling expenses were also publicly defrayed, 
though permanent embassies were unknown. Poets 


278 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


even received a public stipend. No person could draw 
double pay for different service; as, for example, no one 
could claim a compensation as present at the town 
meeting, and as judge, or orator, or senator, on the 
same day. 

The unfortunate, all those incapable of earning a 
living, were sustained by the eleemosynary munificence 
of the State. In this exercise of public philanthropy, 
the Athenians were not imitated by the other Greeks; 
to them exclusively belongs the honor of providing for 
the poor, the helpless, and the aged, at the common 
charge. The Athenian State also supported and edu¬ 
cated the children of those who fell in battle. Those 
who were crippled in war received a pension. Pisis- 
tratus established a military hospital. As to the pro¬ 
vision for the poor, none could receive the benefit of it, 
except they had less property than forty-five dollars. Yet 
this restriction was liberally interpreted. The assistance 
which was afforded, varied from two and a half to five 
cents daily. 

Public rewards and honors formed a'charge upon 
the State. Golden crowns were sometimes awarded, 
or public statues erected. The dowry paid to each of 
the daughters of Aristides, amounted to more than 
$450. 

That the Athenians were at considerable expense in 
times of peace to coUe ff warlike stores, is in itself evi¬ 
dent. The revenue of Athens, in its days of prosperity. 


ECONOMY OF ATHENS. 


279 


was $1,800,000; a large income for so small a State, 
and which could not have been collected, except by the 
consent of the aUies to oppression. 

On the whole, we cannot but feel a strong partiality 
for the Athenian democracy; for though citizenship in 
Athens was an inheritance, and the government was in 
the hands of a minority, yet it was the nearest approx¬ 
imation to a perfectly popular State, of which ancient 
history furnishes the example. Our own revolution 
formed a new era. Our constitutions are an incompa¬ 
rably more perfect development of the principle of civil 
equality, and therefore do not contain within them¬ 
selves the seeds of evd, which wrought the ruin of 
the ancient States. Luxury may, with the increase of 
wealth, diffuse itself among private individuals, but 
frugality ’ remains the true policy of the State. A 
portion of a people, whether it be an aristocracy, 
as in Venice or in England, or a separate multitude, 
like the rulers of Attica, may, and probably will 
become corrupt and unjust; a nation, which acknow¬ 
ledges no political distinctions, can never be blind 
to the principles of equity ; for justice becomes the evi¬ 
dent and permanent interest of all. With us, the great 
body of the citizens is sure of remaining uncontam¬ 
inated ; we have far more to apprehend from the head¬ 
long ambition or downright corruption of those who 
are the depositaries of power. 


THE DECLINE OF THE KOMAN PEOPLE. 


I. 

When Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, on his way 
to Spain, to serve in the army before Numantia, trav¬ 
elled through Italy, he was led to observe the impover¬ 
ishment of the great body of citizens in the rural dis¬ 
tricts. Instead of little farms, studding the country 
with their pleasant aspect, and nursing an indepen¬ 
dent race, he beheld nearly aU the lands of Italy en¬ 
grossed by large proprietors; and the plough was 
in the hands of the slave. In the early periods of 
the State, Cincinnatus at work in his field was the 
model of patriotism ; agriculture and war had been the 
labor and office of freemen; but of these the greater 
number had now been excluded from employment by 
the increase of slavery, and its tendency to confer the 
exclusive possession of the soil on the few. The pal¬ 
aces of the wealthy towered in the landscape in solitary 
grandeur; the plebeians hid themselves in miserable 
hovels. Deprived of the dignity of freeholders, they 
could not even hope for occupation; for the opulent 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 281 


landowner preferred rather to make use of his slaves, 
whom he could not but maintain, and who constituted 
his family. Excepting the small number of the immeas¬ 
urably rich, and a feeble and constantly decreasing class 
of independent husbandmen, poverty was extreme. The 
king of Syria had reverenced the edicts of Roman 
envoys, as though they had been the commands of 
Heaven; the rulers of Egypt had exalted the Romans 
above the immortal Gods; and from the fertile fields 
of Western Africa, Masinissa had sent word that he 
was but a Roman overseer. Yet a great majority of 
the Roman citizens, now that they had become the 
conquerors of the world, were poorer than their fore¬ 
fathers, who had extended their ambition only to the 
plains round Rome. 

The elder Gracchus, when his mind began to brood 
over the disasters that were fast gathering in heavy 
clouds round his comitry, was in the bloom of man¬ 
hood. Sprung from an honorable family, independent, 
though not of the most opulent, connected -with the 
families of the most haughty patricians by the intermar¬ 
riages of his nearest kinsmen, the son of a hero who had 
been censor, had twice been consul and had twice 
gained the honors of a triumph,—grandson of the elder 
Scipio, the victor of Hannibal,—^brother-in-law of the 
younger Scipio the destroyer of Carthage,—^he might 
have entered the career of ambition with every as¬ 
surance of success. Endowed by the kindness of 


282 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


Heaven with admirable genius, he had also enjoyed an 
education superior to that of any of his contemporaries. 
His excellent mother, whom the unanimous testimony 
of antiquity declares to have been the first woman of 
her times, had assembled round his youth the best in¬ 
structors in the arts and in letters; what was then a 
rare thing in Rome, he had learned to rest his head on 
the bosom of the Grecian Muse. Nor were the quali¬ 
ties of his heart inferior to his talents and his nurture. 
His earliest appearance in the Roman army was in the v 
final war against Carthage, under the command of his 
brother-in-law; and when Carthage was taken by 
storm, he, the impetuous soldier of eighteen, led 
the onset, and was the first to ascend the walls of the 
burning city. Yet he was gentle in all his dispositions; 
a maidenly modesty, and a peaceful composure distin¬ 
guished his character; his purity obtained for him in 
youth the unusual distinction of a seat among the 
augurs. His truth and his moderation were cele¬ 
brated. Numantia, a city within the limits of the 
modern kingdom of Castile, had resisted the Roman 
arms with an invincible fortitude, which the com¬ 
panions of Palafox could imitate, but not equal. But 
no , sooner was it announced, that Tiberius Gracchus 
had appeared as a messenger before its ramparts, than 
the gates opened, the natives of Spain thronged round 
his steps, hung on his arms, and clung to his hands. 
They bade him take from their public stores whatever 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 283 


treasures he desired; he took hut a handful of incense, 
and offered it to the Gods. They requested him to 
establish the basis *of a peace, and he framed a treaty 
on principles of mutual independence. 

But, in the vain attempt to give quiet to Spain, 
Tiberius Gracchus did not forget the miseries of Italy. 
Who, that has reflected on the history of nations, has 
not perceived how slow is the progress of change in the 
condition of the laboring class of society ? It is three 
centuries since the eloquent and disinterested Calvin 
first attempted, in the language and on the soil of 
France, to infuse into its peasantry an ameliorating 
principle; and in all that period, how httle improve¬ 
ment has taken place in the physical condition and 
the intellectual culture of the humbler classes of the 
French ! If in the reign of Elizabeth millions of her 
English subjects could not write nor read, it was hardly 
less true of millions during the reign of George IV. 
Histoiy has consisted mainly of the personal achieve¬ 
ments of a few individuals, the victories of armies, the 
scandals of courts, the intrigues of the palace ; on the 
character, rights, and progress of the great mass of the 
people, it has been silent. The Greatest Number has 
been forgotten by the annalist, as its happiness has been 
neglected by th^ lawgiver. 

Human nature was the same of old ; but Gracchus, 
in hoping to improve the condition of the impoverished 
majority of his countrymen, refused to indulge in the 


284 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


vain desires of an idle philanthropy. With the en¬ 
larged philosophy of an able statesman, he sought to 
understand the whole nature of the evil, and to devise 
efficacious measures for its remedy. 

He saw the inhabitants of the Roman State divided 
into the few wealthy nobles; the many indigent citi¬ 
zens ; the still more numerous class of slaves. Rea¬ 
soning correctly, he perceived that it was slavery, 
which crowded the poor freeman out of employment, 
and barred the way to his advancement. It was the 
aim of Gracchus not so much to mend the condition of 
the slaves, as to lift the brood of idlers into dignity; to 
give them land, to make them industrious and useful, and 
so to repose on them the liberties of the State. With 
the fixedness of an iron will, he resolved to increase the 
number of the landed proprietors of Italy, to create a 
Roman yeomanry. This was the basis of his radical 
reform. 

The means were at hand. The lands in Italy were 
of two classes; private estates, and public domains. 
With private estates, Gracchus had no thought to 
interfere. The public domains, even though they had 
been long usurped by the patricians, were to be re¬ 
claimed as public property, and to be appropriated to 
the use of the people, under restrictions which should 
prevent their future appropriation by the few. To ef¬ 
fect this object, required no new order; the proper 
decree was already engraved among the tablets of 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 285 

the Roman laws. It was necessary only to revive the 
law of Licinius, which had slumbered for two centuries 
unrepealed. 

In a republic, he that will execute great designs 
must act with an organized party. Gracchus took 
counsel with the most disinterested men of Rome; 
with Appius Claudius, his father-in-law, a patrician of 
the purest blood; with the great lawyer Mutius Scae- 
vola, who was of consular dignity; and with Crassus, 
the leader of the priesthood ; all of unimpeachable pa¬ 
triotism, and friends to the reform. But his supporters 
at the polls could be none other than the common peo¬ 
ple, composed of the impoverished citizens, and the 
very few husbandmen who had stiU saved some scanty 
acres from the grasp of the aristocracy. 

The people rallied to the support of their cham¬ 
pion; and Gracchus, being elected their tribune, was 
able to bring forAvard his Agrarian Law. “ The wild 
beasts in your land,’’ it was so he addressed the multi¬ 
tude, “ have their dens; but the soldiers of Italy have 
only water and air. Without houses or property, they, 
with their wives and children, are vagabonds. Your 
commanders deceive you, when they bid you fight for 
your hearths, and your gods; you have no hearths, you 
have no household gods. It is for the insolence and 
luxury of others, that you shed your blood. You are 
called the lords of the world, and you do not possess a 
square foot of sod.’’ 


286 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


The famed Agrarian Law, relating only to the pnb- 
Hc domain, was distinguished by mitigating clauses. 
To each of those who had appropriated the land 
without a right, it generously left five hundred acres; 
to each of their minor children, two hundred and fifty 
more; and it also promised to make from the public 
treasury further remuneration for improvement. To 
every needy citizen it probably allotted not more than 
ten acres; perhaps less. Thus it was designed to 
create in Italy a yeomanry; instead of slaves, to sub¬ 
stitute free laborers; to plant liberty firmly in the 
land; to perpetuate the Homan Commonwealth, by 
identifying its principles with the culture of the soil. 
Omnium rerum ex quihus aliquid adquiritur —such were 
long the views of intelligent Homans— nihil est agri~ 
culturd melius, nihil uherius, nihil dulcius, nihil homine, 
NIHIL LiBERO DiGNius. No puTsuit is morc worthy 
of the freeman than agriculture. Gracchus claimed it 
for the free. 

Philanthropy, when it contemplates a slaveholding 
country, may have its first sympathies excited for the 
slaves; but it is a narrow benevolence which stops 
there. The needy freeman is in a worse condition. 
The slave has his task, and also his home and his 
bread. He is the member of a wealthy family. The 
indigent freeman has neither labor, nor house, nor 
food; and, divided by a broad gulf from the upper^ 
class, he has neither hope nor ambition. He is so 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 287 


abject, that even the slave despises him. Tor the 
interest of the slaveholder is diametrically opposite to 
that of the free laborer. I'he slaveholder is the com¬ 
petitor of the free laborer, and by the lease of slaves, 
takes the bread from his mouth. The wealthiest man 
in Rome was the competitor of the poorest free car¬ 
penter. The patricians took away the business of the 
sandal-maker. The existence of slavery made the 
opulent owners of bondmen the rivals of the poor; 
greedy after the profits of their labor, and monopolizing 
those profits through their slaves. In every community 
where slavery is tolerated, the poor freeman wiU always 
be found complaining of hard times. 

The laws of Gracchus cut the patricians mth a 
double edge. Their fortunes consisted in land and 
slaves; it questioned their titles to the pubhc terri¬ 
tories, and it tended to force emancipation, by making 
their slaves a burden. In taking away the soil, it took 
away the power that kept their live machinery in 
motion. A real crisis had come, such as hardly occurs 
to a nation in the progress of many centuries. Men 
are in the habit of proscribing Julius Cesar as the 
destroyer of the Commonwealth. The civil wars, the 
revolutions of Cesar, the miserable vicissitudes of the 
Roman emperors, the avarice of the nobles and the 
rabble, the crimes of the forum and the palace, all have 
their germ in the ill success of the reform of Grac¬ 
chus. 


288 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


We pass over the proofs of moderation which the 
man of the people exhibited, by appearing in the 
Senate, where he had hoped to obtain from the justice 
of the patricians some reasonable compromise; and 
where he was received very much as O’Connell was 
received in the English Parhament, when he pleaded 
for Ireland. The attempt of the aristocracy to 
check aU procedures in the assembly of the people, 
by instigating another tribune to interpose his veto, 
was defeated by the prompt decision of the citizens to 
dismiss the faithless representative; and the policy 
of Gracchus seemed established by the unanimous 
decision of the commons in favor of his decree. 

Such delays had been created by his opponents, 
that the year of his tribuneship was nearly passed; his 
re-election was needed in order to carry his decree 
into effect. But the evil in Borne was already too 
deep to be removed. The election day for tribunes 
was in mid-summer; the few husbandmen, the only 
shadow of a Roman yeomanry, were busy in the field, 
gathering their crops, and failed to come to the sup¬ 
port of their champion. He was left to rest his 
defence on the rabble of the city; and though early 
in the morning great crowds of the people gathered 
together, and though, as Gracchus appeared in the 
forum, a shout of joy rent tlje skies, and was redoubled 
as he ascended the steps of the Capitol, yet when the 
patricians, determined at every hazard to defeat the 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 289 

assembly, came with the whole weight of their adhe¬ 
rents in a mass, the timid flock, yielding to the senti¬ 
ment of awe rather than of cowardice, fled like sheep 
before wolves; and left their defender, the incom¬ 
parable Tiberius, to be beaten to death by the clubs of 
senators. Three hundred of his most faithful friends 
were left lifeless in the market-place. In the fury of 
triumphant passion, the corpse of the tribune was 
dragged tlrrough the streets, and thrown into the Tiber. 

II. 

The deluded nobles raised the fuU chorus of victory 
and joy. They believed that the Senate had routed 
the people; but it was the avenging spirit of slavery 
that had struck the first deadly wound into the bosom 
of Rome. Wlien a funeral pyre was kindled to the 
manes of Tiberius Gracchus, the retributive Nemesis 
lighted the torch, which, though it burned secretly 
for a while, at last kindled the furies of social war,, 
and involved the civilized world in the conflagra¬ 
tion. 

The murder proved the weakness of the Senate,- 
they could defeat the people only by violence. But 
the blood of their victim, like the blood of other mar¬ 
tyrs, cemented his party. It was impossible to carry 
the Agrarian Law into execution; it was equally im¬ 
possible to effect its repeal. 

Gracchus had interceded for the unhappy indigent 


19 


290 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


freemen, whose independence was crushed by the insti¬ 
tution of slavery. The slaves themselves were equally 
sensible of their wrongs; and in the island of Sicily 
they resolved on an insurrection. Differing in com¬ 
plexion, in language, in habits, the hope of liberty 
amalgamated the heterogeneous mass. Eunus, their 
wise leader, in the spirit of the East, employed the 
power of superstition to rally the degraded serfs to his 
banner, and, like Mahomet, pretended a revelation from 
heaven. Sicily had been divided into a few great 
plantations; and now the voice of a leader, joining the 
fanaticism of religion to the enthusiasm for freedom, 
awakened the slaves, not in SicUy only, but in Italy, to 
the use of arms, and the horrors of a servile war. 
Cruel overseers were stabbed with pitchforks; the de¬ 
fenceless were cut to pieces by scythes; tribunals, 
hitherto unheard of, were established, where each 
family of slaves might arraign its master, and, counting 
up his ferocities, adjudge punishment for every re¬ 
membered wrong. Well may the Latin historian grow 
impatient as he relates the disgraceful tale. Quis 
aequo animo ferat in principe gentium populo hella ser- 
vorum ? The Romans had fought their allies, yet had 
fought with freemen; let the queen of nations blush, 
for she must now contend with victorious slaves. 
Thrice, nay, four times, were her armies defeated; 
the insurrection spread into Italy; four times were 
the camps of praetors stormed and taken; the soldiers 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 291 


of the republic became the captives of their bondmen. 
The army of the slaves increased to 200,000. It is 
said, that a million of lives were lost; the statement is 
exaggerated; but Sicily suffered more from the de¬ 
vastations of this, than of the Carthaginian war. 
Twice were consuls unsuccessful. At length, after 
years of defeat, the benefits of discipline gave success 
to the Roman forces. The last garrison of the last 
citadel of the slaves disdained to surrender, could no 
longer resist, and escaped the ignominy of captivity 
by one universal suicide. The conquerors of slaves, a 
new thing in Rome, returned to enjoy the honors of an 
ovation. 

The object of Tibeiius Gracchus, continued by his 
eloquent and equally unhappy brother, who moreover 
was the enlightened and energetic advocate of a system 
of internal improvement in Italy, was the melioration 
of the condition of the indigent freemen. The great 
servile insurrection was designed to efiect the emanci¬ 
pation of slaves ; and both were unsuccessful. But God 
is just and his laws are invincible. The social evil next 
made its effects apparent on the patricians, and began 
with silent but sure influence to corrupt the virtue of 
famihes, and even to destroy domestic fife. Slavery 
tends to diminish the frequency of marriages in the 
class of masters. In a state where emancipation is 
forbidden, the slave population will perpetually gain 
in relative numbers. ' We will not stop to develope 


292 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


the three or four leading causes of this result, pride 
and the habits of luxury, the facilities of licentious 
gratification, the circumscribed limits of productive 
industry; some of which causes operate exclusively, 
and all of them principally, on the free. C The position 
is certain and is universal; nowhere was it more 
amply exemplified than in Rome.^ The rich preferred 
the dissoluteness of indulgence to marriage; and cehbacy 
became so general, that the aristocracy was obliged by 
law to favor the institution, which, in a society where 
all are free, constitutes the solace of labor and the orna¬ 
ment of life. A Roman censor, in an address to the 
people, stigmatized matrimony as a troublesome com¬ 
panionship, and recommended it only as a patriotic 
sacrifice of private pleasure to public duty. The de¬ 
population of the upper class was so considerable, that 
the waste required to be supphed by emancipation; 
and repeatedly there have been periods, when the 
majority of the Romans had once been bondmen. 
It was this extensive cehbacy and the consequent want 
of succession, that gave a peculiar character to the 
Roman laws, relating to adoption. 

The free middling class, which even to the time of 
the younger Gracchus had retained dignity enough to 
seek the amelioration of its condition by the action of 
laws, was destroyed; society became hopelessly di¬ 
vided into the very rich and the very poor; and 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 293 


slaves, who performed all the labor, occupied the in¬ 
termediate position between the two classes. 

The first step in the progress of degradation con¬ 
stituted the citizens, by'their own vote, a class of 
paupers. They called on the State to feed them from 
the public granaries. We cheerfully sustain in decent 
competence the aged, the widow, the cripple, the sick 
and the orphan; Rome supphed the great body of her 
freemen. England, who also feeds a large proportion 
of her laboring class, intrusts to her paupers no elective 
franchise. Rome fed with eleemosynary corn the 
majority of her citizens, who retained the privilege of 
electing the government, and the right of supreme, 
ultimate legislation. Thus besides the select wealthy 
idlers, here was a new class of idlers, a multitudinous 
aristocracy, having no estate but their citizenship, 
no inheritance but their right of suffrage. Both 
were to derive support from the slaves; the Senate 
directly, through the revenues of their plantations; the 
commons indirectly, out of the coffers of the Com¬ 
monwealth. It was a burden greater than the fruits 
of slave industry could bear; the deficiency was sup¬ 
plied by the plunder of foreign countries. The Ro¬ 
mans, as a nation, became a horde of robbers. 

This earhest measure was ominous enough ; the sec¬ 
ond was still more alarming. A demagogue appeared, 
and gaining office and the conduct of a war, organized 
these pauper electors into a regular army. The dema- 


294 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


gogue was Marius. Hitherto the Senate had exercised 
an exclusive control over the brute force of the Com¬ 
monwealth ; the mob was now armed and enrolled, and 
led by an accomplished chieftain. Both parties being 
thus possessed of great physical strength, the civil 
wars between the nobles and the impoverished free¬ 
men, the select aristocracy, and the multitudinous 
aristocracy of Rome, could not but ensue. Marius and 
Sylla were the respective leaders ; the streets of Borne, 
and the fields of Italy became the scenes of massacre ; 
and the oppressed bondmen had the satisfaction of 
beholding the jarring parties in the nation wb'ch had 
enslaved them, shed each other’s blood as freely as 
water. They had, moreover, their triumph. SyUa se¬ 
lected ten thousand from their number, and to gain 
influence for himself at the poUs, conferred on them 
freedom, and the elective franchise. 

Of the two great leaders of the opposite factions, it 
has been asserted that SyUa had a distinct purpose, 
and that Marius never had. Sylla was the organ of the 
aristocracy; to the party which already possessed all the 
wealth, he desired to secure all the pohtical power. 
This was a definite object, and in one sense was attain¬ 
able. Having effected a revolution, and having taken 
vengeance on the enemies of the Senate, he abdicated 
office. He could not have retained perpetual author¬ 
ity ; the forms of the ancient repubhc were then too 
vigorous, and the party on which he rested for support. 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 295 


would not have tolerated the usurpation. He estab- 
hshed the supremacy of the Senate, and retired into 
private life. Marius, as the leader of the people, was 
met by insuperable difficulties. The existence of a 
slave population rendered it impossible to elevate the 
character of his indigent constituents; nor were they 
possessed of sufficient energy to grasp pohtical power 
with tenacity. He could therefore only embody them 
among his soldiers. His partisans suffered from evils, 
which it required centuries to ripen and more than a 
thousand years to heal; Marius could have no plan. 

III. 

Thus the want of a great middling class, consequent 
on the monopoly of land and the institution of slavery, 
had been the ultimate cause of two political revolutions. 
The indigence of the commons had led the Gracchi 
to appear as the advocates of reform, and had en¬ 
couraged Marius to become their militaiy leader. In 
the murder of the former, the Senate had displayed 
their success in exciting mobs ; and in resistance to the 
latter, they had roused up a defender of their usur¬ 
pations. The aristocracy was satisfied with its tri¬ 
umphs ; the impoverished majority, accustomed to 
their abjectness, made only the additional demand 
of amusements at the public expense; and were also 
ignobly content. The slaves alone murmured, and in 


296 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


SpartacHS, one of their number, they found a man of 
genius and courage, capable of becoming their leader. 
Roman legislation had done nothing for them; they 
determined upon a general insurrection, to be followed 
by emigration. The cry went forth from the plains of 
Lombardy, reached'the fields of Campania, and W'as 
echoed through every valley among the Apennines. 
The gladiators burst the prisons of their keepers ; the 
field-servant threw down his manure-basket; Syrian 
and Scythian, the thrall from Macedonia and from 
Carthage, the wretches from South Gaul, the Spaniard, 
the African, awoke to resistance. The barbarian, who 
had been purchased to shed his blood in the arena, re¬ 
membered his hut on the Danube; the Greek, not yet 
indifferent to freedom, panted for release. It was an 
insurrection, as solemn in its object as it was fearful in 
its extent. Rome was on the brink of ruin. Spartacus 
pointed to the Alps; beyond their heights were fields, 
where the fugitives might plant their colony; there 
they might revive the practice of freedom; there the 
oppressed might found a new state on the basis of 
benevolence, and in the spirit of justice. A common 
interest would unite the bondmen of the most remote 
lineage, the most various color, in a firm and happy 
republic. Already the annies of four Roman generals 
had been defeated; already the immense emigration 
was on its way to the Alps. 

If a mass of slaves could, at any moment, on break- 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 297 


ing their fetters, find themselves capable of establishing 
a liberal government; if they could at once, on being 
emancipated, or on emancipating themselves, appear 
possessed of civic virtue, slavery would be deprived of 
more than half its horrors. But the institution, while 
it binds the body, corrupts the mind. The outrages 
which men commit when they first regain their free¬ 
dom, furnish the strongest argument against the con¬ 
dition which can render human nature capable of such 
crimes. Idleness and treachery and theft, are the vices 
of slavery. The followers of Spartacus, when the pin- 
, nacles of the Alps were almost within their sight, 
turned aside to plunder; and the Roman army was 
able to gain the advantage, when the fugitive slave was 
changed from a defender of personal liberty into a 
plunderer. 

The struggle took place precisely at a moment 
when the Roman State was most endangered by foreign 
enemies. But for the difficulties in the way of com¬ 
munication, which rendered a close coahtion between 
remote armies impossible, it would have sunk beneath 
the storm; and from the shattered planks of its noble 
ruins, the slaves alone would have been able to build 
themselves a little bark of hope, to escape from the 
desolation, and occupy by right of conquest the future 
heritage of the Cesars. 


I 


298 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


IV. 

The suppression of the great insurrection of Spar- 
tacus brings us to the age of the triumvirs, and the 
approaching career of Julius Cesar. To form a proper 
judgment of his designs and their character, we must 
endeavor to gain some distinct idea of the condition of 
the inhabitants of Italy during his time, as divided into 
the three classes of nobles, indigent citizens, and slaves. 

The ARISTOCRACY owned the sod and its cultivators. 
The vast capacity for accumulation, which the laws 
of society secure to capital in a greater degree than to 
personal exertion, displays itself nowhere so clearly as 
in slaveholding states, where the laboring class is but 
a portion of the capital of the opulent. As wealth 
consists chiefly in land and slaves, the rates of interest 
are, from universally operative causes, always com¬ 
paratively high; the difficulty of advancing with bor¬ 
rowed capital proportionably great. The small land¬ 
holder flnds himself unable to compete with those who 
are possessed of whole cohorts of bondmen; his slaves, 
his lands, rapidly pass, in consequence of his debts, into 
the hands of the more opulent. The large plantations 
are constantly swallowing up the smaller ones; and 
land and slaves come to be engrossed by a few. Before 
Cesar passed the Uubicon, this condition existed in its 
extreme in the Homan State. The rural indigent crept 
within the walls of Home. A free laborer was hardly 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 299 


known. The large proprietors of slaves not only tilled 
their immense plantations, but also indulged their 
avarice in training their slaves to every species of 
labor, and letting them out, as horses from a hvery 
stable, for the performance of every conceivable species 
of work. Pour or five hundred were not an uncommon 
number in one family; fifteen or twenty thousand some¬ 
times belonged to one master. The immense wealth 
of Crassus consisted chiefly in lands and slaves; on the 
number of his slaves we hardly dare hazard a con¬ 
jecture. Of joiners and masons he had over five hun¬ 
dred. Nor was this the whole evil. The nobles, 
having impoverished their lands, became usurers, and 
had their agents dispersed over all the provinces. The 
censor Cato closed his career by recommending usury, 
as more productive than agriculture; and such was the 
prodigality of the Roman planters, that, to indulge 
their fondness for luxury, many of them mortgaged 
their estates to the money-lenders. Thus the lands of 
Italy, at best in the hands of a few proprietors, 
became virtually vested in a still smaller number 
of usurers. No man’s house, no man’s person, was 
secure. Nulli est cert a domus, nidlum sine pignore 
corpus. Hence corruption readily found its way into 
the Senate; the votes of that body, not less than the 
votes of the poorer citizens, were a merchantable com¬ 
modity. Venalis Curiapatruni. The wisdom and the 
decrees of the Senate were for sale to the highest bidder. 


300 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


The FREE CITIZENS, who still elected tribunes and 
consuls, and were still sometimes convened in a sort of 
town-meeting, were poor and degraded. But the right 
of suffrage insured them a maintenance. The petty 
offices in the Commonwealth were fiUed with their 
nmnber, and such as retained some capacity for busi¬ 
ness found many a lucrative job, in return for their in¬ 
fluence and their votes. The custom-houses, the 
provinces, the internal police, offered inviting situations 
to moderate ambition. The rest clamored for bread 
from the public treasury, for free tickets of admission 
to the theatre and to gladiatorial shows, where men 
were butchered at the cost of the office-seeking aris¬ 
tocracy for the amusement of the majority. But there 
existed no free manufacturing establishments, no free 
farmers, no free laborers, no free mechanics. The 
State possessed some of the forms of a democracy; 
but the life-giving principle of a democracy, prosperous 
free labor, was wanting. 

The third class was the class of slaves. It was 
three times as numerous as both the others; though, 
as we have already observed, the whole body belonged 
ahnost exclusively to the few very wealthy. Their 
numbers excited constant apprehension; but care was 
taken not to distinguish them by a peculiar dress. 
Their ranks were recruited in various ways. The 
captives in war were sold at auction. Cicero, during the 
little campaign in which he was commander, sold men 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 301 


enough to produce at half price about half a miUion 
dollars. When it was told in Rome that Cesar had 
invaded Britain, the people, in the true spuit of 
robbers, could not but ask one another, what plunder 
he could hope to find there. “ There is not a scruple 
of silver,’’ said they, ‘‘ in the whole island ; ” neque 
argenti scrupulum in ilia insula. “ Yes,” it was truly 
answered, ‘‘ but he will bring slaves.” 

The second mode of supplying the slave market 
was by commerce; and this supply was so uniform and 
abundant, that the price of an ordinary laborer hardly 
varied for centuries. The reason is obvious; where the 
slave merchant gets his cargoes from kidnappers, the 
first cost is inconsiderable. The great centres of this 
trafiic were in the harbors bordering on the Euxine; 
and Scythians were often stolen. Caravans penetrated 
the deserts of Africa, and made regular hunts for 
slaves. Blacks were highly valued; they were rare, 
and therefore both male and female negroes were 
favorite articles of luxury among the opulent Romans. 
At one period, Delos was most remarkable as the em¬ 
porium for slavers. It had its harbors, chains, prisons, 
every thing so amply arranged to favor a brisk traffic, 
that ten thousand slaves could change hands and be 
shipped in a single day; an operation, which would 
have required thirty-three or thirty-four ships of the 
size of the vessel in which Paul the Apostle was wrecked. 
There was hardly a port in the Roman empire, conve- 


I 


302 STUDIES IN HISTORY. 

nient for kidnapping foreigners, in which the slave- 
trade was not prosecuted. In most heathen countries, 
also, men would sell their own children into bondage. 
The English continued to do so, even after the intro¬ 
duction of Christianity. In modern times, when men 
incur debts, they have mortgaged their own bodies; the 
ancients mortgaged their sons and daughters. Kidnap¬ 
ping, and the sale of one’s offspring, were so common, as 
to furnish interesting incidents to the writers of novels. 

Besides these sources, the offspring of every female 
slave, whoever might be its father, was also a slave. 

The legal condition of the slaves was extremely 
abject. No protection was afforded his limb or his life, 
against the avarice or rage of a master. The female 
had no defence for her virtue and her honor. Instan¬ 
ces have occurred, where the young female convert to 
Christianity was punished by being exposed to public 
and legalized insults, the most odious to female purity. 
A remnant of the abuse forms the plot of Shakspeare’s 
play of Pericles. No marriages could take place among 
slaves ; they had no property; they could make no 
valid compact; they could hardly give testimony, ex¬ 
cept on the rack. The ties of affection and blood were 
disregarded. In the eye of the law a slave was nobody. 

The manner in which the laborers on the great 
plantations were treated, resembled the modern state- 
prison discipline. They were sent out by day to labor 
in chains, and at night were locked up in cells. 


THE DECLINE OP THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 303 


The refractory were confined in subterranean dungeons. 
Worn out slaves were sold off, like old cattle from a farm. 
The sick were often exposed and left to die. To 
enforce industry, the hand, the lash, and the rod, were 
the readiest instruments. Or domestic slaves were 
sent to various workshops, established on purpose 
to tame the obstinate. Sometimes a fork, like the 
yoke on a goose, was put round their necks; they 
were placed in the stocks ; they were chained. Every 
expedient, that human cruelty could devise, was em¬ 
ployed to insure industry and docility. The runaway, 
if retaken, was branded, or crucified; or punished by 
the loss of a leg; or compelled to fight wild beasts; or 
sold for a gladiator. The slave was valued only as 
property, and it was a question for ingenious dispu¬ 
tation, whether, in order to lighten a vessel in a storm 
at sea, a good horse, or a worthless slave should be 
thrown overboard. 

Slaves occupied every station, from the delegate 
superintending and enjoying the rich man’s villa, to 
the meanest office of menial labor, or obsequious 
vice; from the foster mother of the rich man’s 
child, to the lowest condition of degradation, to which 
woman can be reduced. The public slaves handled 
the oar in the galleys, or labored on the public works. 
Some were lictors; some were jailers. Executioners 
were slaves; slaves were watchmen, watermen, and 
scavengers. Slaves regulated the rich palace in the 


304 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


city; and slaves performed all the drudgery of the 
farm. Nor was it unusual to teach slaves the arts. 
Virgil made one of his a poet; and Horace himseK 
was the son of a freedman. The Merry Andrew was a 
slave. The physician, the surgeon, were often slaves. 
So too the preceptor and the pedagogue; the reader 
and the stage player; the clerk and the amanuensis; 
the buffoon and the mummer; the architect and the 
smith; the weaver and the shoemaker; the undertaker 
and the bearer of the bier; the pantomime and the 
singer; the rope-dancer and the wrestler, all were 
bondmen. The armiger or squire was a slave. Not 
an avocation, connected with agriculture, manufactures, 
or public amusements, can be named, but it was the 
patrimony of slaves. Slaves engaged in commerce; 
slaves were wholesale merchants; slaves were retailers; 
slaves shaved notes; and the managers of banks were 
slaves. 

Educated slaves exercised their profession for the 
emolument of their masters. Their value varied with 
their health, beauty, or accomplishments. The com¬ 
mon laborer was worth from seventy-five to one hun¬ 
dred dollars, the usual cost of a negro in the West 
Indies, when the slave-trade was in vogue. A good 
cook was worth almost any sum. An accomplished 
play actor could not be valued at less than $8,000. A 
good fool was cheap at less than $800. Beauty was a 
fancy article, and its price varied. Mark Antony gave 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 305 


$8,000 for a pair of beautiful youths; and much higher 
prices have been paid. About as much was given for 
an illustrious grammarian. A handsome actress would 
bring far more; her annual salary might sometimes be 
$13,000. The law valued a physician at $240. Lu- 
cuUus, having once obtained an immense number of 
prisoners of war, sold them for sixty-five cents a head; 
probably the lowest price for which a lot of able-bodied 
men was ever offered. 


V. 


Such was the character of the Italian population, 
over which a government was to be instituted, at the 
time when Cesar with his army approached the Rubi¬ 
con. In the contest which followed, it was the object 
of Pompey to plunder, to devastate, and to punish. 
“ Should Pompey be successful, not one single tile will 
be safe in an Italian roof,” says Cicero; “ I know right 
well, he desires a government like that of Sylla.” There 
did not exist any armed party in favor of a democratic 
republic. The spirit of the democracy was gone; and 
its shade only moved with powerless steps through 
the forum and the temples, which had once been the 
scenes of its glory. 

It was in the service of his country that Cesar car¬ 
ried his eagles beyond the Rubicon. The republican 
poet, who represents Rome rising before the con- 
20 


306 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


queror in a vision, and demanding of him the occasion 
of his appearance in arms on her borders, describes 
him as replying, 

“ Roma, fave coeptis! Non te furialibus armis 
Perseqnor; en adsum,^—^ubique tuns.’" 

In seasons of violence, despotism is the child of 
anarchy. Men rush to any strong arm for protection. 
Such despotism, like that of Cromwell or of Napoleon, 
is transitory. Permanent despotism can grow only out 
of fixed relations of society. Julius Cesar was a great 
statesman, not less than a great soldier. His ambition 
was in every thing gratified ; the noise of his triumphs 
had fiUed the shores of England, the marshes of Bel¬ 
gium, and the forests of Germany. Any political dis¬ 
tinction was within his reach. He was childless ; and 
therefore his pride hardly seemed to require a subver¬ 
sion of the Commonwealth. And yet, with all this, 
he perceived that the continuance of popular liberty 
was impossible in the actual condition of the Roman 
State; that a wasting, corrupt, and most oppressive 
aristocracy was preparing to assume the dominion of 
the world; that this aristocracy threatened ruin to 
the provinces, perpetual cruelty to the slaves, and 
hereditary contempt to the people. Democracy had 
expired; and the worst form of aristocracy, far worse 
than that of the Venetian nobles of a later day, 
could be prevented only by a monarchy. Julius 
Cesar resolved on the establishment of a monarchy; 



THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 307 


for he saw, that a monarchical form of government was 
the only one which would endure in Rome. Had he 
possessed the virtues of Washington, the democracy of 
Jefferson, the legislative genius of Madison, he could 
not have changed the course of events. The condition 
of the Roman population demanded monarchy. This 
was the third great revolution prepared by slavery, and 
the consequent decay of the people. 

Despotism, in the regular order of Divine Provi¬ 
dence, is the punishment of a nation for the institution 
of slavery, and is the consolation or the cure of he¬ 
reditary bondage. Ths slave wears his chains with 
composure, when he sees liis owner also in chains. 
The laborer felt less humiliation, when he beheld his 
master cringing at the feet of a master. The despot 
has no interest to invent charges of treason against any 
but the very rich; the peaceful poor man, the humble 
slave, has nothing to fear from his rapacity. When, at 
a later day in Roman history, a tyrant emperor made 
his horse a consul, the slave could glory in the hu¬ 
miliation of his owners; the people could laugh at the 
degradation of their oppressors; and the appointment, 
after all, was probably a popular one. “ That the con¬ 
dition of a slave is better under an arbitrary, than 
under a free government, is supported by the history 
of all ages and nations.” It is common to say, that 
the democracy introduces despotism and a strong 
executive. It is tnie, that despotism is brought in by 
the majority; it is tnie, that when great extremes of 


308 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


fortune exist, it is the clear and well-understood interest 
of the rich to prevent a despotism. But it is false, 
that despotism is the child of democracy. Despotism 
cannot take place until the spirit of democracy is ex¬ 
tinct. When by the progressive increase of differences 
in the condition of men, society is hopelessly changed 
into a few immensely rich and the many indigent; 
when the people can, from their humble condition 
and the operation of the laws of property, no longer ex¬ 
ercise a regular influence on government; when they are 
bowed under the yoke of a few wealthy families, then 
the people cure the evil which grew out of the ine¬ 
quality of conditions, by pushing that inequality to the 
extreme; and, in order to put down an insolent and 
oppressive aristocracy, they, by a spasmodic effort, 
create, or, obeying the natural course of events, 
submit to a despotism. Thus the aristocracy brings 
on the unjust inequalities for which despotism is the 
remedy. The usurpations of a strong government, 
with the assent of the people, imply previous usur¬ 
pations in the aristocracy. Witness the despotism of 
Denmark, established by the people for their protection 
against the nobility. Witness the policy of Louis 
XIV. and his predecessor; witness Henry VII. and 
Henry VHI., in England, absolute monarchs, tolerated 
in their extravagant usurpations, that so the power 
of the great landed aristocracy might be restrained, 
and the authority of the church subjected. Witness 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 309 

the present constitution of the Russian empire, brought 
about, in like manner, by the act of the nation, to 
restrain the ambition of the nobles. 

There remained no mode of establishing a fixed 
government in Rome, but by the supremacy of one 
man. In Italy, no opposition was made to Cesar on 
the part of the people or of the slaves, but of the aris¬ 
tocracy alone; and they could offer resistance only 
in the remoter subjected districts, with the aid of hire¬ 
ling troops, sustained by the revenues of the provinces 
which were still under the control of the Senate. The 
people conferred on Cesar all the power which he 
could desire; he was created dictator for a year, that 
he might subdue his enemies, and consul for five years, 
that he might confirm his authority. The inviolabihty 
of his person was secured by his election as tribune 
for life. 

^Yhat would have been the policy of Julius Cesar, 
cannot be safely conjectured. To say that he had no 
plan is absurd ; every step in his progress was marked 
by consistency. The establishment of monarchy was 
already an alterative to slavery. Cesar issued an 
ordinance, not indeed of immediate abolition, but com¬ 
manding that one third part of the labor of Italy should 
be performed by free hands. The command was ren¬ 
dered inoperative by his assassination, the greatest mis¬ 
fortune that could have happened to Rome. Ror who 
were his murderers ? Not the people; not the insur- 


310 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


gent bondmen; but a portion of the aristocracy, to 
whom the greatest happiness of the greatest number 
was a matter of supreme indifference. 

The great majority of the conspirators have never 
found a eulogist. Every ancient writer speaks of them 
with reprobation and contempt. Cassius, one of the 
chief leaders, was notoriously selfish, violent, and dis¬ 
gracefully covetous, not to say dishonest. He is uni¬ 
versally represented as envying injustice rather than 
abhorring it, and his conduct has ever been ascribed to 
personal malevolence, and not to patriotism. But 
Brutus!—History never manufactured him into a 
hero, till he made himself an assassin. Of a head¬ 
strong, unbridled disposition, he displayed coolness 
of judgment in no part of his career. It was his 
misfortune to have been the son of an abandoned 
woman, and to have been bred in a home, which 
adultery and wantonness had defiled. The vices of 
early indulgence may be palliated by his youth and the 
licentiousness of his time; but Brutus, while yet young, 
was a merciless and exorbitant usurer, at the rate of 
four per cent, a month, or forty-eight per cent, a year. 
When his debtors grew unable to pay, he obtained for 
his agent an appointment to a mihtary post, and ex¬ 
torted his claims by martial law. The town of 
Salamis, in the isle of Cyprus., owed him money on 
the tenns we have mentioned. He caused the mem¬ 
bers of its bankrupt municipal government to be con- 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 311 


fined in their town-haU, in the hope that hunger would 
quicken their financial skill; and some of them were 
starved to death. Such was Brutus at that ingenuous 
period of life, when benevolence is usually most active. 
He hated Pompey, yet after deliberating, he joined 
the party of that leader, and remained true to it, so 
long as it seemed to be the strongest; but no sooner 
was the battle of Pharsalia won, than Brutus gave in 
his adhesion to Cesar, and to confer a value on his 
conversion, he betrayed the confidence of the fugitive 
whose cause he had abandoned ! In the plot against 
Cesar, Brutus was the dupe of more sagacious men. 

Cesar had received the Senate sitting; this insult 
required immediate vengeance. They murdered him, 
not from pubhc spirit, but from mortified vanity and 
angry discontent. The people, who had been pleased 
with the humiliation of their oppressors, were indignant 
at the assassination, and the assassins themselves had 
no ulterior plan. 


Slavery, by the gradual extermination of free labor 
and an industrious self-relying people, had poisoned 
the Roman State to the marrow; and though the con¬ 
spirators had no fixed line of policy, yet the condition 
of the population of Italy led immediately to mon¬ 
archy. The young Octavian owed his elevation, not to 


312 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


his talents, but to the state of the times. Popular gov¬ 
ernment had become an impossibility, and monarchy 
was the only mode of restraining the rapine of the 
Senate. 

Slavery prepared the way for Oriental despotism by 
encouraging luxury. The genius of the Romans was 
inventive ; but it was only to devise new pleasures of 
the senses. The retinue of servants was unexampled; 
and the caprices to which men and women were sub¬ 
jected, were innumerable. The Roman writers are so 
full of it, that it is unnecessary to draw the picture, 
which would indeed represent humanity degraded by 
the subserviency of slaves, and by the artificial desires 
and vices of their masters. This detestable excess ex¬ 
tended through the upper class. Women ceased to 
blush for vices which, in other times, render men infa¬ 
mous. Benejicium sexus sui vitiis perdiderunty et quia 
foeminam exuerunt, damnatae sunt morbis virilihus. 
At Rome, the gout was a common disease in the cir¬ 
cles of female dissipation and fashion. The rage of 
luxury extended also, in some sort, to the people. 
For them, tens of thousands of gladiators were sacri¬ 
ficed without concern; for them, the enslaved Jews 
raised the gigantic walls of the Coliseum, the most 
splendid monument of the corruptness of human na¬ 
ture ; for them, navies engaged in actual contests; 
and the sailors, as they prepared for battle, received 
only an avete, on their way to death. 


THE DECLINE OF THE EOMAN PEOPLE. 313 


In like manner, the effect of slavery became visible 
on public morals. Among the slaves there was no 
such thing as the sanctity of marriage; dissoluteness 
was almost as general as the class. The slave was 
ready to assist in the corruption of his master's family. 
The virtues of self-denial were unknown. But the 
picture of Roman immorality is too gross to be ex¬ 
hibited. Its excess can be estimated from the extrav¬ 
agance of the reaction. When the Christian religion 
made its way through the oppressed classes of society, 
and gained strength by acquiring the affections of the 
miserable whose woes it solaced, the abandoned man¬ 
ners of the cities excited the reproof of fanaticism. 
When domestic life had almost ceased to exist, the 
universal lewdness could be checked only by the most ex¬ 
aggerated eulogies of absolute chastity. Convents and 
nunneries grew up, at the time when more than half the 
world were excluded from the rites of marriage, and were 
condemned by the laws of the empire to promiscuous 
indulgence. Vows of virginity were the testimony 
which religion bore against the enormities of the age. 
Spotless purity could alone fitly rebuke the shameless¬ 
ness of excess. As in raging diseases, the most violent 
and unnatural remedies need to be applied for a season, 
so the transports of enthusiasm sometimes appear ne¬ 
cessary to stay the infection of a moral pestilence. 
Thus riot produced asceticism ; and monks, and monk¬ 
ish eloquence, and monastic vows were the protest 
against the general depravity of manners. 


314 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


The gradual decay of the class of ingenuous freemen 
had been a conspicuous result of slavery. The cor¬ 
ruptions of licentiousness spared neither sex; and the 
consequence was so certain, that it was not long, 
before the majority of the cohorts, of the priesthood, 
of the tribes, of the people, nay of the Senate itself, 
came to consist of emancipated, slaves. But the sons 
of slaves could have no capacity for defending freedom; 
and despotism was at hand when, beside the sove¬ 
reign, there were few who were not bondmen or the 
children of bondmen. 

Borne was sufficiently degraded, when the makers 
of an emperor, stumbling upon Claudius, the wisest 
fool of the times, proclaimed him the master of the 
Roman empire. Slavery now enjoyed its triumph, for 
a slave became prime minister. lo Saturnalia, shout¬ 
ed the cohorts, as Narcissus attempted to address 
them. But the consummation of evil had not arrived. 
The husband of Messalina had, naturally enough, taken 
up a prejudice against matrimony; the governors of 
the weak emperor, who managed him as absolutely as 
Buckingham managed James I., insisted upon his mar¬ 
rying Agrippina. He did so; and Agrippina, assisted 
by freedmen and slaves, disinherited'his son, murdered 
her husband, and placed Nero on the throne. Slaves 
gave Nero the purple. 

The accession of Nero is the epoch of the virtual 
establishment of the fourth revolution. The forms of 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 315 


ancient Home still continued, but Nero was the incar¬ 
nation of depravity; the very name by which men are 
accustomed to express the fury of unrestrained ma- 
hgnity. Bad as he was, Nero was not worse than 
Rome. She had but her due. Nay, when he died, 
the rabble and the slaves crowned his statues with gar¬ 
lands, and scattered flowers over his grave. And why 
not ? Nero never injured the rabble, never oppressed 
the slave. He murdered his mother; his brother; 
his wife; and was the tyrant of the wealthy; the 
terror of the successful. He rendered poverty sweet, 
for poverty alone was secure; he rendered slavery 
tolerable, for slaves, alone, or slavish men, were pro¬ 
moted to power. The reign of Nero was the golden 
reign of the populace, and the holiday of the bondman. 
The death of Gracchus was avenged on the descendants 
of his murderers. 

Despotism now became the government of the Ro¬ 
man empire. Yet there was such a vitality even in 
the forms of liberty, that they were still in some degree 
preserved. Two centuries passed away, before the last 
vestiges of republican simplicity disappeared, and the 
Eastern diadem was introduced with the slavish cus¬ 
toms of the East. Up to the reign of Diocletian, a 
diadem had never been endured in Europe. Hardly 
had this emblem of servility become tolerated, when 
language also began to be corrupted; and, ^Hthin the 
course of another century, the austere purity of the 


316 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


Greek and Roman tongues, the languages of Demos¬ 
thenes and of Gracchus, became for the first time 
familiarized to the forms of Oriental adulation. Your 
imperial Highness, your Grace, your Excellency, your 
Immensity, your Honor, your Majesty, then first 
became current in the European world; men grew 
ashamed of a plain name; and one person could not 
address another without following the custom of the 
Syrians, and calling him Rabbi, Master. 

It is a calumny to charge the devastation of Ita¬ 
ly upon the barbarians. The large Roman planta¬ 
tions, tilled by slave labor, were its ruin. Verum 
confitentibus, latifmdia Italiam perdidere. The care¬ 
less system impoverished the soil, and wore out even 
the rich fields of Campania. Large districts were 
left waste; others had been turned into pastures; and 
grazing substituted for tillage. The average crops 
hardly ever returned a fourfold increase. Nam frumenta 
majore quidem parte Italiae, quando cum quarto respon- 
derint, via) meminisse possumus. This is the confession 
of the eulogist and the teacher of agriculture. Italy 
was naturally a very fertile country; but slave labor 
could hardly wring from it a return one half, or even 
one third so great, as free labor gets from the hills and 
vales of New England. Eor centuries it did not pro¬ 
duce corn enough to meet the wants of its inhabitants. 
Rome was chiefly supplied from Sicily and Africa, and 
the largest number of its inhabitants had for centuries 
been fed from the public magazines. 


THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE. 317 


The Barbarians did not ruin Italy. The Romans 
themselves ruined it. Slavery had effected the de¬ 
cline of the Roman people, and had wasted the land, 
before a Scythian or a Scandinavian had crossed the 
Alps. 

When Alaric led the Goths into Italy, even after 
the conquest of Rome, he saw that he could not sus¬ 
tain his army in the beautiful but desert territory, unless 
he could also conquer Sicily and Africa, whence alone 
daily bread could be obtained. His successor was, 
therefore, easily persuaded to abandon the unpro¬ 
ductive region, and invade the happier France. 

Attila had no other purpose, than a roving pilgrim¬ 
age after booty; and asihis cupidity was little excited, 
and the climate was ungenial, the unlettered Calmuck 
was overawed by the Roman priesthood, and diverted 
from indigent Italy to the more prosperous North. 
Rome still remained an object for plunderers, but none 
of the barbarians were tempted to make Italy the seat 
of empire, or Rome a metropolis. Slavery had de¬ 
stroyed the democracy, had destroyed the aristocracy, 
had destroyed the empire; and at last it left the traces 
of its ruinous power deeply furrowed on the face of 
nature herself. 


RUSSIA. 


The origin of the Russian nation is involved in the 
obscurity which hangs over most events belonging to a 
remote antiquity. Even the question, to what race of 
men the first inhabitants of European Scythia or Sar- 
matia belonged, is one which the investigations of 
modern inquirers have never been able to answer. 
‘‘ Of Russia, strictly so called,” says the indefatigable 
Schlozer, ‘‘the ancients, from Herodotus to Charle¬ 
magne, knew as little as of Otaheite.” Sarmatia and 
Scythia are vague appellations, applied to unknown re¬ 
gions in the North. 

It is therefore impossible for the historian to 
derive the Russians from any race of the continent of 
Asia. Whatever may have taken place in the period, 
to which their annals do not ascend, and respecting 
which no clear allusions are to be found in foreign his¬ 
torians, to us they appear in the light of aboriginal in¬ 
habitants of the provinces which now constitute the 
centre of the empire. Erom the first they present 


RUSSIA. 


319 


themselves with a language and character of their own; 
they have no community with the Tartars, or with the 
Goths; they were distinct from the Huns, though they 
may have served under the banners of Attila, in the 
time of his glory, and may afterwards have received 
among themselves the fragments of a nation, whose 
season of power had been so short, and yet so de¬ 
structive. The remains or the exiles of other nations 
are to be found in the central provinces of Russia; but 
the emigrants seem never to have even impaired the 
nationality of the original inhabitants; but rather to 
have become incorporated with them to the entire loss 
of their own distinctive character. The Russian, there¬ 
fore, is of all the present European peoples the one 
which may lay the best grounded claims to antiquity 
of residence in its present abodes. In the darkness of 
ancient centuries, extended over vast plains, into which 
the genius of Greece and the arms of Rome never pene¬ 
trated, this people were slowly ripening to nationality 
during the ages of classic splendor, when Solon gave 
laws to the Athenians, and Rome strove after principles 
of public justice and liberty. If the Rhoxolani or 
Rhossolani were a branch of them, they were not 
wholly unknown during the wars of ]\Iithridates; 
and in the period of the Roman emperors they some¬ 
times visited the mouths of the Danube, sometimes 
scaled the Carpathian mountains; and the province of 
Moesia was not safe against their precipitate and care¬ 
less valor. 


320 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


Till the middle of the ninth century, it is on all 
hands agreed that the history of the Russians has no 
authenticity. But even the earliest season in which 
some facts appear supported by various testimony, is 
involved in an uncertainty, which nothing but the most 
careful criticism can in any degree dispel. The ori¬ 
ginal manuscript of the chronicles of Nestor is no longer 
to be found; and its copies have undergone so many 
alterations and interpolations, that it is difficult to 
separate the genuine from the false. Besides, who was 
this monk of the eleventh century, to whom Providence 
has conceded the singular honor of being almost the 
sole depositary of the early history of his nation ? 
The accounts of the monk of Kiew coincide in many 
things with those of the Byzantine historians. Did he, 
then, draw his information exclusively from original 
sources, or was he guided in his inquiries by the 
writers of the eastern empire ? Could there have been 
any written document in existence among the Russians 
on which he may have founded his narrative ? Does 
not the time which intervened between the age of 
Nestor and that assigned for the foundation of the 
Russian empire, leave room to doubt the security of 
oral tradition ? And could a monk of Kiew be accu¬ 
rately informed of what passed at Novgorod ? It is 
evident, that Nestor was not unacquainted with foreign 
literature. Are we to infer from it, that he was the bet¬ 
ter able to register the course of events ? Or shall we 


RUSSIA. 


321 


suppose that he was led by the influence of foreign 
forms to give to Russian history an aspect of greater 
certainty than belonged to it? The accounts of Nes¬ 
tor, therefore, while they have an uncertain value for 
the whole period through which they extend, are of 
less questionable credibility in all that relates to the 
times immediately preceding his own. 

Tradition traces the foundation of Kiew to the 
middle of the fifth centmy; the historians of the 
eastern empire, not less than Nestor, have preserved 
the accounts of an expedition, which is said to have 
been made by its princes against Constantinople in the 
ninth century. Nor does the commercial republic of 
Novgorod lay claim to a less ancient existence. Estab¬ 
lished on the banks of the Volchova and not far from 
Lake Ilmen, its situation explains its commerce with 
the North along the coasts of the Baltic; and its mer¬ 
chants exchanged at Constantinople their furs and 
honey and wax, the produce of their fisheries, and 
perhaps also slaves, for the wines and cloths of Grecian 
manufacture. The power and the wealth of the repub¬ 
lic were conspicuous even in these earhest times. 
Their successors reduced many of their neighbors 
to subjection; and of the surrounding nations, whom 
they inspired with terror, they proudly demanded— 
‘‘ Who will dare to attack God and the great Nov¬ 
gorod ? ” 

But a change was impending, which seems to have 
21 


322 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


proceeded from those domestic grievances and defects 
which are the result of age. What an idea of the an¬ 
tiquity of the Russian nation do we thus receive ? Its 
first distinct historical celebrity is connected with the 
downfall of a repubhcan state; the new dynasty of 
princes elevated its grandeur on the ruins of liberty. 
It is said that in some of the oldest temples of Egypt, 
the materials of the fabrics which are now standing 
show signs of having been previously used, so that the 
oldest buildings of the oldest civilized country are con¬ 
structed of ruins ; in like manner the history of modern 
Russia begins with the subversion of an ancient system 
by a domestic revolution. 

The constitution of Novgorod is not known; but 
prosperity produced divisions, and divisions terminated 
in weakness. The Varagians, the pirates of the Baltic, 
men who seem rather to have been united by common 
habits than by common descent, a people numerous 
and warlike, attacked the republic from the north. At 
the same time the Sclavonian tribes of the south saw 
their liberties endangered by the Khozares, who were 
advancing from the shores of the Euxine. The citizens 
of Novgorod, being thus reduced to a state of danger 
and distress, voluntarily yielded up their liberties to 
foreign masters. A solemn deputation was sent to the 
sea-coast, and Riurick, or Rurik, with his two brothers 
and a large train of countrymen, came to rescue the 
Russian provinces from foreign invasion, and lay the 


RUSSIA. 


323 


foundations of an empire, which even yet does not seem 
to have reached its limits. 

It was in 862, or more probably in 852 (for Rus¬ 
sian chronology has little certainty before the year 879), 
that the Russian throne was estabhshed. The history 
of the kingdom of France dates from 843; but the 
reign of Hugh Capet dates only from 987. England 
was not united under one sovereign tiU 827. The 
glory of the house of Hapsburg reaches no further than 
1232 ; there was not even a duchy of Austria till 1156. 
The Prussian monarchy is but of yesterday. Accord¬ 
ing to ancient chronicles, and the indirect evidence 
of the Greek historians, the Russian throne extends 
almost as far into the middle ages, as the establishment 
of the French kingdom, or the union of the Heptarchy 
of England; while it surpasses in antiquity almost 
every other existing government in Europe. 

With respect to the earhest Russian dynasty, it 
may be well to separate the doubtful from the certain. 
That a republic should invite three brothers to anni¬ 
hilate its liberties and reign with unmitigated sovereign¬ 
ty is improbable, though not absolutely without exam¬ 
ple. It cannot be decided, nor is it of the least mo¬ 
ment for the subsequent events in Russian history to 
decide, to what nation the family of Rurik originally 
belonged. Nestor says they came from the north. In 
that case they were kindred vnth the Normans, perhaps 
were Swedes. That uith Rurik two brothers should 


324 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


have come also and established principalities, should 
have died within two years and thus left Rurik lord 
of a vast and undivided territory, is not impossible, yet 
in itself not natural. That some nobles of his retinue 
should have gained of him permission to descend the 
Dnieper and attack Constantinople, and should have 
appeared before that city vdth two hundred vessels, is 
inconsistent with the rest of the narration. The infer¬ 
ence is therefore forced upon the inquirer, that the Boses 
of the Greeks were not the Russians of history. The 
points on which reliance may be placed, are simple and 
sufficient. In the course of the ninth century the 
Sclavonian tribes in the heart of Russia were united 
under one sovereign; their dominion gradually ex¬ 
tended to Kiew; the name of Russians, which had 
long existed, became a general appellation ; and finally, 
the family which traces its origin from Rurik was 
the ruling dynasty of Russia for more than seven hun¬ 
dred years. 

Russia forms a connecting link between ancient 
and modern history. Prance, Spain, and England, 
were all conquered, and adopted the manners, the dia¬ 
lect, and the learning of their conquerors. In the 
heart of Germany, the Teutonic race preserved itself 
free from the loss of its language and its nationality. 
Have not the nations of Teutonic descent proved, by 
the results of their influence on human events and in¬ 
telligence, that, as a mercy and a benefit to the world. 


RUSSIA. 


325 


their name and nation were preserved unsubdued and 
unmixed ? Have not some of the most valuable princi¬ 
ples in learning, in philosophy, in religion, and, we may 
add, in the imaginative arts, been the results of their in¬ 
dependence ? Though it was long before they learned to 
unite the elegances of other times with native dignity 
and the acquisitions of knowledge, yet have they not at 
last shown themselves strong in the depth of sentiment, 
in earnest truth, and moral sublimity ? And is it going 
too far to hope, that one branch of the great Sclavonic 
family is yet to develop an independent character; that 
a nation, which has its unity and identity confirmed and 
endeared by a community of language, of religious 
faith, and of historical recollections,—a nation placed on 
lands which join the Caspian and the White Sea, the 
Baltic, and the most important basin of the Mediter¬ 
ranean,—a nation occupying a soil intersected by the 
largest rivers of Europe, and offering great and increas¬ 
ing facilities of navigation by canals,—a nation which 
reaches from the country of the vine and ohve, to the 
latitudes of perpetual fi'ost, and thus unites within 
itself all the conditions of national strength, commercial 
independence, and intellectual energy,—is it unreason¬ 
able to trust that the future course of such a nation is 
to be marked by results favorable to the best interests 
of humanity ? That its copious and harmonious lan¬ 
guage is to become the voice of the muses, and the 
instrument of science ? That culture is to find a way 


326 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


into its healthful and fertile valleys, and that rehgion and 
civil liberty are eventually to win new trophies in these 
immense regions of ancient darkness ? The Russian em¬ 
pire, like the United States, if comparatively weak for 
pm’poses of foreign aggression, is invincible within itself. 
Its soil is capable of sustaining, without supposing an 
uncommon degree of cultm'e, a population of a hundred 
and fifty millions; the most vigorous government may 
find enough to do in controlling the members of this 
vast body politic; the most ambitious can have with¬ 
in its limits the means of gratifying an unwearied 
activity. It already covers a vaster extent of territory 
than any which the annals of the world commemo¬ 
rate, except it be the transitory dominion of the 
Zingis. Wliere every motive of philanthropy, and of 
the true passion for glory, impels to the diffusion of 
sciences and arts, the advancement of the purposes 
of peace and intelligence, the full display of the great 
and good qualities which exist in the ancient race that 
has held the north from immemorial ages, it seems not 
an unreasonable expectation, that the voice of humanity 
and of justice wiU be heard. It may be within the 
purposes of a controlling Providence, that the agency 
of the Russian empire shall spread respect for Chris¬ 
tianity through the hearts of idolatrous nations. Its 
emissaries have already reared the temples of a purer 
religion among the Tartar states of Siberia, and planted 
the cross on the mountains of Kamschatka. The 


RUSSIA. 


327 


traveller, as he wanders towards the pole, in latitudes 
where com is ripened in a day (a day that extends 
over weeks), hears the sounds, and sees the character 
of a Christian worship; and monasteries are estab¬ 
lished even in the remote isles of the White Sea: the 
shores of the Caspian have ceased to acknowledge a 
Mahometan master, and the ancient fable of the 
prisoner of ]\Iount Caucasus, the purest and most 
subhme invention of ancient mythology, has been but 
the faint shadowing forth of more glorious truths, 
which are making themselves felt and acknowledged 
in the very heart of the mysterious land of classic 
superstition. 

But if, on the contrary, the form of autocracy 
should prove incompatible with the diffusion of know¬ 
ledge, and if Russia should fail to attain to a govern¬ 
ment insuring the free development of national energy 
and the strict accountabihty of public servants, there 
may ensue a new migration of the nations and a 
subversion of ancient order, like the terrible devas¬ 
tations of the great destroyer of the middle ages. 
Wliat force could the western nations oppose to the 
gradual advancement of Russian supremacy? The 
capital of Poland is nearly the centre of Europe, and 
it is in the hands of the Russians; Austria has posses¬ 
sions which are said to sigh for the yoke of Sclavonic 
masters, rather than yield allegiance to the house of 
Hapsbiu-g; Pmssia holds the ports through which 


328 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


provinces of the mighty state have their intercourse 
with the sea; and probably the prosperity of both 
parts would be promoted by a union of the seaports and 
the interior under the stronger government. The 
Wallachiahs, the Moldavians, are of the same religious 
faith. It is not many years since Europe shrieked at 
the aggressions on Poland; yet now a large part of the 
old Polish provinces rejoice in being re-united to their 
ancient brethren; the heart of the kingdom, the grand 
duchy of Warsaw, has not for centuries enjoyed such 
tranquillity, such security, or such general prosperity, 
as at present; the Polish provinces of Prussia lament 
their separation from their fellow-citizens of the old 
republic. Where, then, is the barrier against Russia 
on her frontiers ? On the north, she extends to the 
poles, and the conquest of Einland has made her inac¬ 
cessible from the Scandinavian peninsula; on the east, 
her limit is the Pacific, unless, indeed, we take into 
account her possessions in North America. On the 
south, she is herself most formidable to every one of 
her neighbors. Caucasian countries and the keys of 
Persia are already hers; no vessels sail on the Cas¬ 
pian but by her permission; she holds more than 
half the shores of the Black Sea; the Turkish power 
may yet shine forth in temporary lustre before it 
expires; but religious and national enthusiasm, and 
personal bravery, cannot resist the infiuence of causes 
which are constantly operating, and always increasing 


RUSSIA. 


329 


m strength. Thus, Russia, inaccessible on the south, 
east, and north, stands in a menacing attitude towards 
the south-east and the west of Europe. Did not Peter 
the Great wish to become a state of the German 
empire ? Has not a part of the Baltic coast belong¬ 
ing to Prussia been repeatedly grasped at ? Did not 
the wise, the temperate, the forbearing Alexander, 
accept from his suffering and prostrate ally a portion 
of coveted territory in Galicia? Did he not, even 
after the peace of Tilsit, partake in the spoils of his 
unhappy associate in arms? The memory of these 
things has not perished; has justice intrenched herself 
in firmer sanctuaries ? Has the consciousness of moral 
obligation so far gained force, that the appearance 
of a tyrant on a powerful throne would no longer 
perplex monarchs with a fear of change ? 

The statesman that believes in human virtue, may 
still seek for a guarantee of right in permanent interests, 
and in sufficient strength to repel unjust aggressions. 
It is painful to suppose that the balance of power in 
the north is so far destroyed, that the strongest hope 
of security lies in the wisdom of governments, the per¬ 
sonal virtues of sovereigns, and the cordial union of the 
weaker nations. 

But it is said that the Russian empire is a huge 
mass, which mil of itself fall asunder. And why will 
it faU asunder ? Is there not the tie of kindred in the 
great nucleus of the empire ? Is not the whole well 


330 


STUDIES IN HISTORY 


annealed and firmly joined? Is it not cut off and 
separated from tlie rest of Cliristendom by its peculiar 
churcli discipline ? Is it not one and undivided by its 
descent ? Is it not bound together by having the same 
mihtary heroes, the same saints, the same recollections, 
civil and sacred? Next to Prance, it is of all the states 
of Europe the one which is safest against division. 
How much more secure in its unity is Russia than 
Austria, which yet is secure except from some general 
convulsion. Of the Poles, the Russians, the Hun¬ 
garians, the Bohemians, the Germans, the lUyrians, 
and the Italians, which by their motley union con¬ 
stitute the iU-assorted mosaic of the great central 
sovereignty, how many at present dislike the Austrian 
supremacy ! Will Hungary submit to be a dependency 
on a country of far less natoal resources ? Will the 
beautiful and fertile Bohemia consent to the anni¬ 
hilation of its language, its national laws and con¬ 
stitutions, its time-hallowed liberties ? Will Russians 
prefer the sway of a foreign power to sharing the glory 
of their kindred ? WiU Poles desire to remain divided 
from Poles ? Prussia labors under infinitely greater 
danger of dismemberment than Russia. The idea, 
that Russia wiU of itself break in pieces, is unfounded 
in the history or the character of the component parts 
of that empire. 

But still it is so vast, so unwieldy !—And is it 
more easy to tear a member from a leviathan than a 


RUSSIA. 


331 


fly ? Are the limbs of a beast less firmly knit, 
because they are huge and massive? It is a clear 
lesson of history that large states hold together, 
long after wisdom has departed from the councils of 
their governors. The Roman empire never fell till it 
was shaken from abroad. The Greek empire lasted a 
thousand years longer, and would, in all probabflity, 
have lasted to this day, had it not received an irresist¬ 
ible shock from a nation which as yet had no home. 
Now the danger which is said to hang over Russia is 
solely from within itself. 

The history of the future cannot be read in the ex¬ 
perience of the past. We may trust that the new 
relations, which are rising in the world, will yet lead to 
a balance of power, dependent on the moral force of 
intelligence. We can but hope that a bright and 
peaceful futurity awaits a government, on which de¬ 
pends directly the happiness of sixty millions of men, a 
fifteenth part of the human race; a government which 
holds under its sway a large portion of the whole 
habitable globe; a government whose soil is sus¬ 
ceptible of infinite improvements, and whose popu¬ 
lation is but just beginning to bear some reasonable 
proportion to its natural abundance. The voice of 
Sclavonic poetry has already been heard, and the 
lessons of the Russian bards are full of the noblest 
moral truths. The Russian press is active. Works 
on domestic history are multiplying. The spirit of the 


332 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


nation is aroused by the recollections which go back for 
so many centuries. The pride of national feehng is 
deep and strong, and arts and letters are making their 
way into the heart of a country which from its earhest 
ages has possessed an aptitude for learning. 

Nor should it be left out of view, that while the 
general administration is autocratic, the municipal reg¬ 
ulations are free; that local customs, constitutions, and 
religious peculiarities, are preserved; and that while 
there is no legitimate guarantee of civil liberty, and no 
exact hmit to check the infringement of the imperial 
authority on particular privileges, yet practically the 
local institutions are respected; and in an autocracy, 
of which the territory is immense, the hand of the- 
sovereign is not felt in its rudeness except in his 
personal vicinity. It is in a small kingdom that 
a tyrant is the most dreaded monster. In a large 
state the personal vices of the sovereign extend in 
their direct influence hardly beyond his immediate 
train. 

They who limit their attention in Russian annals to 
anecdotes which illustrate the debauchery of the court, 
the ignorance of the nobles, or the superstitions of the 
vulgar, close their eyes on one of the greatest specta¬ 
cles. The reception of the Russians into the pale of 
civilized Christendom forms an epoch in civilization, so 
wide are its influences, so powerful, grand, and benefi¬ 
cent the consequences to which it has led and may 


RUSSIA. 


333 


lead. How different would have been the future of 
the world if the Russian state with its present power 
had adopted the manners and the religion of the east ? 
What safety would there now be to Christian Europe ? 
What increased dangers would not hang over its liber¬ 
ties? He that can neglect such results in the de¬ 
lineation of strange and uncouth manners, or in the 
scandalous chronicles of the licentiousness of an im¬ 
moral court, gives up the contemplation of the great 
revolutions in national destinies, to the imworthy office 
of analyzing the vices of individual profligates. One 
of the noblest branches of knowledge, the history of 
nations, loses its dignity and value. 


334 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


I. 

Shortly before the discovery of America, the Rus¬ 
sian nation began to renew its glory. The victories 
of Tamerlane, by weakening the enemies of the Grand 
Prince of Moscow, had prepared the way for his suc¬ 
cessful refusal to send further tribute to the Golden 
Horde; and the great mass,of Russian strength, reviv¬ 
ing after a servitude of almost two and a half centuries, 
made conquests in every direction, under three suc¬ 
cessive princes of the house of Rurik. 

Por fifteen years of his reign, Ivan the Great had 
paid tribute to the Tartars ; but in the year 1492, his 
power was firmly estabhshed as an independent prince. 
Some Russian merchants had been plundered by the 
Turks of Caffa. Ivan expostulated in a letter to Bajazet. 
‘‘ Whence arise these acts of violence ? Are you aware 
of them, or are you not ? One word more: Mahomet, 
your father, was a great prince; he designed to send 
ambassadors to compliment me; God opposed the exe¬ 
cution of this project. Why should we not now see 
the accomplishment of it ? ’’ And in 1498, the ambas- 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


335 


sador of the Grand Duke (the title of Czar had not yet 
been assumed) was charged “ to comphment the Sul¬ 
tan standing, and not on his knees; to address his 
speech only to that sovereign himself, and to yield pre¬ 
cedence to no other ambassador; and not in any man¬ 
ner to compromise the dignity of his master.” The 
Russians, for another half century, remained unknown 
to the western kingdoms of Europe. Even after their 
conquests embraced Kazan and Lapland, they had no 
maritime intercourse with the rest of the world. 

It is our present purpose briefly to trace the origin, 
the progress, and the political results of hostihties be¬ 
tween the Ottoman and the IMuscovite empires. The 
first rencounter of the Turks and Russians in a field of 
battle is assigned by Karamsin to the year 1541, on 
occasion of resistance shown to Sahib Gherai on the 
banks of the Oka. “There,” says the Russian his¬ 
torian, “we for the first time beheld Ottoman tro¬ 
phies in our hands.” But Von Hammer explains, that 
the trophies were those of a Tartar Khan, and not 
of Turks. 

In the year 1553, the English sent forth three ships 
for the discovery of a Northeastern passage to Cathay 
or China. Two of them were wecked; the third, 
commanded by Richard Chancellor, proceeded to “an 
unknown part of the world,” and reached a place where 
there was “ no night at all, but a continual light and 
brightness of the sun shining clearly upon the huge 


336 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


and miglity sea.” At length they came to a bay, and 
the mouth of the Dwina, and report having announced 
them to the terrified natives as men of “a strange 
nation, of singular gentleness and courtesy,” Chancellor 
was able to travel into the interior. He found that 
the country was called Russia, or Muscovy, and that 
Ivan Vassihevitch 11. ‘‘ruled and governed far and 
wide.” This was “ the discovery of Russia,” of 
which the fame spread through Spain the belief “of a 
discovery of New Indies,” and in England gave imme¬ 
diate impulse to mercantile adventure; so completely 
had Russia been withdrawn from the eye of the rest of 
Europe, just as she was about to enter on a career of 
splendid, permanent, and increasing conquest. 

About the time that accident opened to the English 
merchants the avenue of Archangel, the Ottoman 
empire had attained its height under the sway of 
Solyman the Magnificent. His private misfortunes, 
his weakness as a lover, and his cruelty as a father, are 
favorite historical topics for those who delight to ob¬ 
serve the workings of human passions on the arena of 
the world. But Solyman also had courage, enterprise, 
a love for letters, a fondness of magnificence in archi- 
tectm-e. He himself commanded in thirteen cam¬ 
paigns, and the terror of his name pervaded Asia and 
Europe. His fieets besieged Marseilles, and alarmed 
Rome by anchoring in the mouths of the Tiber, while 
from the Persian Gulf they seized Bassora on the 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 337 


Tigris; on the Mediterranean Sea, pirates plundered in 
his name, and the Ararat was hardly a hmit to his 
emissaries on land. He left to his successor, Selim II., 
an empire extending in the east to Van and districts 
which Russian arms subdued during the summer of 
1829; in the west, to Gran, within less than a hun¬ 
dred miles of Vienna. The conquest of Algiers and 
Tripoli had carried its dominion southerly to Nubia 
and the deserts of Africa, while in the north, towards 
Poland and Russia, the country of the Cossacks was 
interposed, and the line of respective sovereignty was 
still undetermined. The Nile and the Danube flowed 
through the domains of the Grand Sultan; the khan 
of the Crimea was his tributaiy and ally; the rich 
provinces which had witnessed and sustained the lux¬ 
ury of the Seleucidse, were his; Palestine and a part 
of Arabia had submitted to him; Persia was overawed 
by his superior power, just as it now lies at the mercy 
of the Czar; and the Black Sea, and the Sea of Azoph 
were exclusively within liis jurisdiction. The vast re¬ 
sources of these immense, populous, and opident re¬ 
gions, were under the control of one will, and might 
be called forth with secrecy and despatch; liis regular 
troops were admirably disciphned; and his artillery 
had been brought to a state of excellence by skil¬ 
ful engineers. Such was the Ottoman power, at the 
period of its first aggression on Russia. 

That aggression, the first war between Russia and 
22 


338 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


the Porte, happened in the year 1569. Just thirteen 
years before this invasion, the Russian Czar, Ivan the 
Terrible, had succeeded in conquering the kingdom of 
Astracan. The Porte on the contrary held Azoph, the 
country round the mouth of the Don, and all the 
neighboring coasts. The interest of Selim seemed to 
require the possession of Astracan, that he might in¬ 
vade Persia from the north, while one of his officers 
suggested uniting the waters of the Don and the Volga 
by a canal, for the purpose of facihtating the transpor¬ 
tation of munitions of war. The fourth of August was 
the evil day for the Porte, when three thousand jani¬ 
zaries and twenty thousand horsemen moved against 
Astracan; while five thousand janizaries and three 
thousand laborers made their way to Azoph. These 
ascended the Don to the place where that river is less 
than thirty miles from the Volga, and the excavations 
were commenced with incredible zeal. But the Prince 
Serebianow appeared with fifteen thousand Russians; 
and the janizaries and the workmen were massacred 
or dispersed. Meantime the garrison of Astracan 
made a successful sally upon their besiegers. The 
Turks were compelled to retreat; hoping still for the 
speedy arrival of succor. But a part of the army of 
the Tartars failed to appear, through jealousy of the 
too great preponderance of the Porte, which compro¬ 
mised their independence; a part had been attacked 
and cut to pieces by the Russians. The Turks, in 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


339 


despair, trusted themselves in their flight to Tartar 
guides, who led them on purpose through destructive 
morasses, from fear for the security of their own nation; 
and, finally, a miserable wreck only returned to Azoph, 
of an army which had gone forth in the pride of certain 
victory. The khan of the Crimea, who had anticipated 
his own entire subjection from the success of the Turk¬ 
ish enterprise, filled the desponding army with super¬ 
stitious fears. His emissaries represented, that in the 
regions on the Don and the Wolga, the winter extends 
over nine months, and that in summer the night is 
but three hours long; while the law of the prophet ap¬ 
points the evening prayers two hours after sunset, and 
the morning orisons at the break of day. Terrified at 
the seeming contradiction between nature and the ordi¬ 
nances of their religion, they embarked at Azoph to re¬ 
turn ; but a storm at sea completed the ruin of the 
expedition; and of all who had been sent out on the 
great design, hardly seven thousand came back to Con¬ 
stantinople. Peace was restored between Russia and 
the Porte in 1570 by a Russian embassy. Yet it was 
remarked and remembered, that Sehm, in giving au¬ 
dience to the Muscovite envoy, neglected to inquii’e after 
the health of the Czar, and took no concern for the hos¬ 
pitable entertainment of his ambassador. 


340 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


II. 

More than a century passed away before the 
Russian and Turkish arms again met in battle. The 
spirit of conquest had never carried the Mahometans 
far to the north; Muscovy offered no places of abode 
which they coveted; and the Ukraine promised little 
booty. Russia itself had also been suffering a series of 
revolutions, w^hich were finally to insure its prosperity. 
The old line of Rurik had come to an end; the throne 
had been usurped by a tyrant, marked by every vice 
and possessing no claim as a descendant of the ancient 
race of monarchs. At length a fierce opposition left 
the usurper no chance of escape, and he took poison. 
His son survived him but a few weeks. A pretender 
to the crovm then entered the metropolis in triumph, 
and the false Demetrius held the supreme authority for 
a year and a month, tiU he too fell a victim to his own 
intemperate cruelty. Foreign aggressions ensued. The 
people proclaimed Shuskoi, a domestic prince, for their 
sovereign; but a succession of disasters placed the un¬ 
happy ruler at the mercy of Poland, while Sweden also 
strove to get one of its princes proclaimed in his stead. 
Absolute ruin seemed the inevitable doom of Russian 
power. But of a sudden a few patriots collected an 
army, rescued Moscow, and won a victory over the 
Poles. Then the Russians assembled and proceeded to 
the solemn election of a sovereign. The choice was 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 341 


unanimous; and the whole nation hailed as its chief 
the youthful Michael, the first of the house of Ro- 
manow. Thus after an interregnum and fifteen years 
of disasters, the Russians were again united, and victory 
returned to their standards. Michael struggled suc¬ 
cessfully against the Poles and the Swedes; he entered 
into a treaty of peace with Turkey, on terms of mutual 
friendhness, obtaining the recognition of his authority, 
and security against the incursions of the Tartars; and 
finally, he was the first European sovereign on record, 
who sent a solemn embassy to China, and formed with 
that power a treaty of amity and commerce. 

The long and prosperous reign of Michael, from 
1613 to 1645, was succeeded by a reign hkewise long, 
wise, and prosperous. The authority of Michael had 
sprung from the pure source of a patriotic election; his 
son Alexei, who reigned from 1645 to 1676, confirmed 
the interior of the state, reformed the laws, won back 
from Poland many provinces, which had been extorted 
from Russian weakness, and was indefatigable in pro¬ 
moting the general welfare of the state. The father of 
Peter the Great was himself a man of justice and of 
mildness. 

His eldest son, Peodor, followed him as Czar from 
1676 to 1689. He was of a weak constitution, yet of 
an active mind and unwearied industry. It was soon 
after his accession to the sovereign power, in the year 
1677, that the second war between Russia and the 


342 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


Porte grew out of the fickleness of the Zaporagian Cos¬ 
sacks. That most singular race of men, .either piqued 
at the haughtiness of the Turks, or preferring the sove¬ 
reignty of those who were most ready and able to 
give them aid, placed themselves under the protection 
of the Russians. 

The Cossacks, the mixed descendants of Russians, 
Poles, and Tartars, had remained in subjection to 
Poland since the fifteenth centmy, and had formed 
an excellent bulwark against the Turks and Tartars. 
They rebelled unsuccessfully in 1648, and again in 
1651; and finally, in 1654, most of them sought pro¬ 
tection of Russia, though a part chose rather to acknow¬ 
ledge the supremacy of the Porte. A conflict ensued 
between the Czar and the republic of Poland, ending 
with a compromise exceedingly favorable to the Rus¬ 
sians. It remained to secure the country of those, 
who, in the first instance, had submitted to the Sul¬ 
tan, but now desired to be incorporated with their 
kindred. 

The war was of three years duration; the incidents 
were few; the results of lasting importance. An at¬ 
tack was ordered by the grand vizier upon Tchiriquin, 
the chief place of the Zaporagians, on the banks of the 
river Tiasmin. But the Russians were on their guard, 
and repelled the Turks with their entire discomfiture. 
The next year, the new grand vizier, the famous Cara 
Mustapha, the same who afterwards besieged, and, but 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 343 


for Sobieski, would have taken Vienna, renewed the at¬ 
tack with a host which, according to his own threats, 
was “ innumerable as the stars of the heavens.’’ The 
town of Tchiriquin was taken; but the success was bar¬ 
ren of consequences; and Cara Mustapha retired to 
seek a more conspicuous theatre of action. 

A truce of twenty years was concluded at Radzyn, 
in the year 1680. The Zaporagian Cossacks remained 
under the Russians; the Porte renounced every claim 
to the Ukraine and to Tchiriquin, and guarantied Rus¬ 
sia against any invasion from the khan of the Crimea; 
and finally the Tartars ceded several places to Russia, 
as dependencies of Kiev. The plain between the 
Dnieper and the Dniester was declared to be an inde¬ 
pendent waste, in which no Tartars were to settle. 

Such was the honorable peace, concluded by the 
brother of Peter the Great. Peodor was a man of lofty 
mind, and of great energy of will. It was he who col¬ 
lected the books, in which the records of the rank of 
the several nobles were inscribed, and burnt them all 
in the presence of an immense assembly. This having 
been accomplished, he made proclamation, that “ privi¬ 
leges and high offices are not the prerogatives of noble 
birth, but are to be obtained by personal merit alone.” 

III. 

The third war between Russia and the Porte, com¬ 
menced in 1086, and did not cease till 1698; nor was 


344 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


peace established till 1700. The early death of Teodor 
IL, in 1682, opened the supreme power of Russia to the 
ambition of Sophia. During the first part of her reign, 
her sway was undisputed ahke by the weakness of her 
elder brother, Ivan, or the boyhood of the younger, 
Peter. The favorite of the female regent was the 
Prince Galitzin, a statesman of laborious habits and 
sagacity. The Austrian emperor was still engaged in 
a protracted war with the Turkish power; and Vienna 
had been saved only by the magnanimous heroism of 
the Polish king. It was seen, that in Russia an impor¬ 
tant auxiliary might be obtained; and Polish and Aus¬ 
trian diplomacy were busy in seeking the aUiance. 

The wary Galitzin saw the advantages which Russia 
might win by a rupture with Turkey. At that time 
there was not one single harbor on the Black Sea be¬ 
longing to the Muscovite; and the mouths of the Don 
and the port of Azoph began to seem essential to Rus¬ 
sian advancement. But Galitzin did not engage im¬ 
petuously in the alliance. A treaty with Poland bearing 
date May sixth, 1686, and denominated “ The Perpetual 
Peace,” required that republic to resign aU claims to 
Smolensko and the Ukraine, as the prehminary to the 
alliance which first united Austria and Russia against 
the Porte, under the express condition that no separate 
peace should be concluded. At the same time, the 
relations of Russia with western Europe were renewed. 
Many centuries before, a Russian princess became the 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 345 


mother of the French kings; in 1687 the first embassy 
of modem Russia appeared in Paris. 

The campaigns of 1687 and 1688 were both unsuc¬ 
cessful. In the former, the failure was attributed to 
the treachery of the Cossacks; in consequence of 
which, their Hetman was banished to Siberia, and the 
notorious Mazeppa promoted to his place. In the sec¬ 
ond campaign, the Tartars being defeated, set fire to 
the arid prairies, and the flames, as they spread widely 
and continued long, involved many of the people and 
their cattle in the conflagration, and destroyed aU 
means of forage. 

But a new era was approaching for the internal re¬ 
lations of Russia. Peter had assumed his equal right 
to sovereignty, at the age of sixteen; a bloody revolu¬ 
tion secured the new Czar in power; and the war with 
the Turks was almost forgotten for a series of years. 
The intrigues of the court and the interior of the 
empire, had occupied the attention of the restless Czar. 
But at length his ambition coveted an establishment on 
the Black Sea, and the capture of Azoph was resolved 
upon. In 1695, a fleet, built upon the Voronez, a 
navigable branch of the Don, descended the stream, 
and entered the Sea of Azoph. A numerous army was 
provided to repel the invasions of the Tartars ; another 
was employed in conducting the siege. Yet the first 
eflbrts of the young Czar were rash and unsuccessful. 


346 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


He lost, during the campaign, many thousands of his 
troops, and failed to take the city. 

Great success is usually preceded by defeats. Peter 
became more cautious; he obtained from abroad better 
engines and artillery, and when in the next spring the 
siege was renewed, it was found impossible for the 
Turkish garrison to hold out. The city surrendered; 
the fortifications were repaired; the harbor was im¬ 
proved; and the Russian standard was for the first 
time planted in triumph on the shores of waters which 
connect with the Mediterranean. Previously to the 
surrender of the place, the small Russian fleet had en¬ 
gaged the Turkish squadron, and to the astonishment 
of Europe, the fleet of a naval power which had been 
the terror of the civilized world, especially of the 
Mediterranean Sea, was vanquished by the boats of 
Russian sailors, who had hardly before seen, much less 
unfurled a sail, and whose only maritime commu¬ 
nication with the rest of mankind, had been through 
the port of Archangel. The victorious army returned 
in triumphal procession to Moscow. Peter modestly 
joined in the crowd of gazers, took part in applauding 
the merit of the conquerors, and himseK appeared as a 
private volunteer in the train of a superior officer. 

On the continuance of the war, further advantages 
were gained at Azoph, and Perecop was taken after a 
murderous battle with the Tartars. But it was Eugene 
who accelerated peace by his success mth the Aus- 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 347 


trian forces at Zenta. Intrusted for the first time with 
the chief command, he dared to disobey the emperor’s 
orders, which prohibited an engagement, and attacked 
the numerous Turkish army in the presence of the Sul¬ 
tan. Two hours, and a loss of five hundred men, pro¬ 
cured a complete and decisive victory. “The sun 
seemed to linger on the horizon,” said the youthful 
hero, to whose enthusiasm a little glorying may be 
pardoned, “ to gild with his last rays the triumphant 
standards of Austria.” The peace of Carlovitz gave to 
Peter a truce of two years, and the possession of Azoph 
with all its dependencies. The towns on the mouths 
of the Dnieper were dismantled, but remained under 
Turkish supremacy. This truce, entered into on the 
twenty-fifth of January, 1699, was converted into a 
definitive peace for thirty years, on the third of July, 
1700. 

Perhaps the reader is curious to know what honors 
were lavished on the hero whose first command was 
rendered illustrious by a victory, which gave repose to 
Russia, Poland, and Austria? It may be asked, what 
artists were engaged to preserve his features in marble? 
What public distinctions marked the deliverer of his 
sovereign? AVliat rank, what estates, what triumphal 
entries were awarded* to the modest and valiant Eu¬ 
gene? When the hero delivered the great seal of the 
Ottoman empire to the Austrian sovereign, he was 
welcomed with no approbation. He was soon after 


348 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


arrested for fighting a battle against orders; was de¬ 
prived of his sword; and like a malefactor, put under 
arrest. It was no new thing for Austria to be imgrate- 
ful. In September, 1683, during this same war of 
Austria with Turkey, the Polish king had saved Vienna 
from falhng into the hands of the Turks. But John 
Sobieski was an elective king ; and the cabinet of the 
emperor gravely consulted, if such an one had ever had 
access to the imperial presence, and in what manner he 
ought to be received. The deliverer of Vienna, the 
open, brave, chivalric Sobieski, was finally admitted to 
an interview, the formalities of which had been settled 
with ungrateful and pusillanimous punctiliousness. 

On the other hand Peter the Great set at nought 
the distinctions of decorum as well as the vain ones 
of birth. He made of a baker’s boy, who had once 
cried bread in the streets of Moscow, but who had 
abilities for rendering important services to the state, 
a general, a prince, a companion, and a friend; and 
raised to the rank of czarina a servant maid, whose 
venal beauty had first attracted his desires, and whose 
intellectual endowments and heroism had finally won 
his esteem 


IV. 

Our design extends no further than to trace the 
results of the successive wars which Russia waged with 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 349 


her southern neighbor. We cannot even glance at the 
succession of brilhant victories and strange disasters, 
which made of the Swedish Charles at one moment the 
dictator of the north, and not many years after, the 
fugitive dependent on the charities of Turkey. The 
Turks manifested admiration for the unbending ener¬ 
gies of this northern hero, and submitted to the influ¬ 
ence of one who had only his own haughty stubborn¬ 
ness to inspire respect. The fourth war of Russia and 
the Porte was but an interlude to the grand drama 
which the northern nations had been enacting along 
the provinces on the Baltic. It is remarkable as the 
only one of the whole series in which the crescent had 
the superiority; and it almost cost the reformer of the 
Russian nation his hberty and the fruits of liis la¬ 
borious life. 

This war was one of aggression on the part of the 
Porte. Peter strove hard to avoid it. It was declared 
in Constantinople, on the twentieth of November, 
1710; and the counter-declaration of Russia was 
published at Moscow, in February, 1711. On the 
side of the Porte, the intrigues of the Swedish king 
had been seconded by the apprehensions of the khan 
of the Crimea, who feared that his own territory would 
next be coveted by his rapacious neighbor. The Sul¬ 
tan also heard with dismay of a Russian fleet in the 
harbor of Taganrog, and of Russian fortiflcations and 
artillery at Azoph. 


350 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


The Czar was attended during the campaign by the 
woman, who, from a servant girl and captive, had risen 
to be his wife. The hospodar of Moldavia, the unfor¬ 
tunate Cantemir, proved a faithful ally to the Russians; 
the hospodar of Wallachia had also sought a corre¬ 
spondence with Peter; but finding a rival traitor in 
favor, by a second infidelity he returned to his alle¬ 
giance to the Porte. Cantemir was unable to make 
good the promises which he had given in sincerity; 
while Brancovan, the hospodar of Wallachia, assisted 
in decoying Peter into an inextricable position. 

When the Czar found himself, with no more than 
about twenty-two thousand men, encompassed by a 
hostile army of two hundred and seventy thousand, 
near the Pruth, suffering for want of water, without 
strength to hazard a battle, or force a retreat, or make 
good a defence, his magnanimity did not desert him. 
A messenger was despatched to his senate, declaring 
that his authority should cease with his liberty, and 
that in case - of his death, the senate should proceed to 
elect the worthiest of their number his successor. 

But the counsels of a woman saved him. The 
czarina proposed negotiations; and the grand vizier 
deemed a peace the surest way of securing the interests 
of his master. Its terms were, the restoration of 
Azoph; the destruction of the fortifications of Ta¬ 
ganrog ; the free return of the Swedish monarch 
to his realm. The grand vizier had further demanded. 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 351 


that the person of Cantemir, the rebellious subject of 
the Porte, should be dehvered up. “ I would rather,” 
answered the Czar, ‘‘ cede all the territory between this 
and Kursk; I should have the hope of some day re¬ 
covering it; but my broken faith would be irreparable: 
I cannot violate my promise; honor is the only thing 
that is peculiarly ours; and to renounce it is to cease 
to be a monarch.” 

Informed of the negotiation, Charles XII. hastened 
to the Ottoman camp, to reproach and to question the 
grand vizier. “ Haw dare you,” said the Swede, “how 
dare you sign the peace without first having my royal 
sanction, for whose interest the war was begun ? ” 
The grand vizier rephed, “that his sublime master 
had ordered him to combat for the interests of the 
Ottoman empire.” “ You might have led the Czar and 
his army captive to Constantinople,” said the king. 
“ And if I had taken the Czar,” replied the vizier, with 
insulting apathy, “ who would have governed his states 
in liis absence ? It is not well for all kings to live 
abroad.” 

A delay in the surrender of Azoph had nearly 
renewed the war; but peace was finally established in 
April, 1712, under Enghsh and Polish mediation. The 
evacuation of Poland by the Russian armies was a new 
condition. 

Thus were the plans of Peter in the south entirely 
frustrated. The acquisitions of his youth were lost; 


352 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


the Russian fleets disappeared on the Sea of Azoph; 
the Euxine remained wholly a Turkish sea; and the 
southern commerce of Russia was once more deprived 
of aU safe and natural issues. The Czar sought indem¬ 
nification in the north; his affections were indeed more 
fixed upon that region, since it brought him into im¬ 
mediate connexion with civihzed Europe; and Sweden 
was at last compelled to cede even more than he had 
demanded. 


It was on occasion of the peace with Sweden in 1721, 
that the Czar was saluted by the Russian senate, the 
synod, and the people, with the title of Emperor of all 
Russia, which was at once acknowledged by Sweden, 
the Netherlands, and Prussia; but which was not 
adopted by the German empire tiQ 1747, nor by 
Spain tni 1759. 

Eour and twenty years had elapsed since the disas¬ 
ters on the Pruth had left to the Turkish power the pride 
of success. But the spirit of the Russians burned to 
avenge their reverses, and wipe away the recollection 
of their last treaty of peace. In the field-marshal 
Munich, the empress Anna found for her forces a 
leader, whom Frederick the Great has called the 
Eugene of the North. Thus in 1735, a fifth toar 
against the Porte was resolved upon, and Austria was 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


353 


induced to take part in it, through the hope of aggran¬ 
dizement on her eastern frontier. 

The war on the part of Russia was conducted with 
glory. Azoph was besieged and taken; and the 
Crimea invaded, but not reduced. Otchakov was 
conquered amid streams of blood, in 1737. The 
following year was not without its disasters; but in 
1739 the Dniester was passed, the fortress of Choczim 
reduced, and all Moldavia feU into the possession of 
Russia. 

On the part of Austria, there had, on the contrary, 
been displayed a singular succession of ignorant and 
pusdlanimous leaders and statesmen. Modem history 
hardly furnishes an example of such want of energy, 
union, and abihty, as was seen in the whole course of 
the management of the war, and stiU more in the 
negotiations for peace. The Austrian plenipotentiary 
pleaded the express instructions of his sovereign; the 
emperor charged the envoy with treachery and weak¬ 
ness ; and the Austrian councils exhibited, in a season 
of trial and danger, the loathsome spectacle of petty 
minds, sacrificing the large interests of nations in the 
pursuit of private intrigues, and the gratifications of a 
mean-spirited, narrow, and quarrelsome ambition. 

It was on that occasion, in 1739, that Austria sm*- 
rendered Belgrade, and accepted the Danube, the Save, 
and the Unna, for boundaries. The history of the 
Austrian part of the war is a series of common events,. 

23 


354 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


rescued by no characteristics, except the magnitude of 
the interests at issue, from the dull mediocrity of 
ordinary routine. The Austrian plenipotentiary was 
subjected in the Turkish camp to every kind of in¬ 
dignity. The grand vizier cut short all negotiation. 

There is but one God,’’ such was his style of diplo¬ 
macy, ‘'and I have but one word; and that is, 
Belgrade.” 

Thus deserted, Russia was glad to withdraw from 
the contest. The conditions which she obtained, re¬ 
trieved her honor. The treaty of the Pruth was 
annulled; the imperial dignity of the Russian monarch 
was acknowledged; Azoph remained this time to the 
Russians; the territory of Russia in the Ukraine was 
extended. But it was also stipulated, that Russian 
ships were not to sail on the waters of the Euxine. 
The positive results of the war were considerable; but 
the moral influences on the tone of feeling in Russia, 
were of vastly more moment. Henceforth the Turkish 
power was regarded with comparative disdain. The 
decisive superiority of Russian arms, and the perfected 
organization of the Russian military forces, were due to 
the genius of Munich. 

And what was his reward ? He had hoped for an 
independent principality, which he was to conquer from 
the Porte. He subsequently devised the method of su¬ 
perintending the war department of the empire. Disap¬ 
pointed in his ambition, he resigned his public employ- 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 355 


ments. At the end of a series of revolutions, he was 
arraigned before an inquisitorial tribunal. Vexed at 
their minute examinations, the veteran exclaimed, 
“Write down what answers you please, and I Avill 
sign them.’’ They did so, and he was condemned to 
death; but the empress Elizabeth, who, during her long 
reign permitted no capital punishment, would only ban¬ 
ish him to Siberia. There he occupied a house which he 
had himself caused to be erected for the bloody Biren. 
liis residence, or rather his prison, was an isolated build¬ 
ing, situated on a morass, completely exposed to obser¬ 
vation. The income allowed for the maintenance of his 
household was twelve shillings a day. He amused 
himself with teaching boys geometry; and his name 
was still a terror in all the neighboring provinces. The 
reverses of fortune, which are frequent in Russian 
history, surpass the succession of scenes in a masque¬ 
rade. The engineer who planned and executed the 
canal of Ladoga was left to draw diagrams for children 
in Siberia. He, whose voice had always rung hke a 
trumpet in the ears of his army, and poured an irre¬ 
sistible flood of troops to the assault of Otchakov and 
Choczim, had no wider space for action than a marshy 
farm, and was himself transformed to a herdsman, hal¬ 
looing to his cattle, on whose milk he in part depended 
for the daily expenses of his household. 

At the age of seventy-nine, the venerable old man 
was recalled by Peter HI.; and one who knew him. 


356 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


describes him then to have been the model of aged, 
manly beauty. As he returned from his exile, he 
knew not if any one of his blood had been left alive; 
but a band of thirty-three of his descendants assembled 
to welcome him back to society and civihzation. 


VI. 

The sixth war of Russia and the Porte was begun 
by the latter power, and had for its immediate cause 
the determination of the Porte to preserve the inde¬ 
pendence of Poland. Catharine was not averse to war. 
The aged Munich had retained the fervor of his mind, 
and during the first years of the reign of the empress, 
she who was susceptible to every thing which promised 
glory or accession of power, loved to hear the octo¬ 
genarian chief detail the plans which Peter had con¬ 
ceived, and the empress Anna weU nigh executed. 

The Porte strenuously demanded the evacuation of 
Poland by the Russian armies. Prance encouraged 
the sultan, who was a man of great firmness, to insist 
on the demand. Catharine, on the contrary, was 
determined by intrigues, divisions, and force of arms, 
to control the Polish government. Prussia and Aus¬ 
tria acceded to her designs, and became partners in the 
aggressions on a state, which, at that time, possessed a 
territory not inferior in extent to Prance. 

A peace of thirty years had diminished the mihtary 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


357 


zeal of the Ottomans. They began the war, and yet 
were obliged to act on the defensive. Austria was a 
quiet spectator; Frederick of Prussia even paid sub¬ 
sidies to the new Semiramis. 

On the other hand, Catharine was animated by 
every motive which ambition and vanity could suggest. 
All Europe seemed to rejoice that a woman was to 
execute, what so many brave men had failed to carry 
into effect. Voltaire flattered Catharine as though she 
had been a goddess ; and expressed for her every sen¬ 
timent of adoration which courtly flattery could adopt. 
‘‘Barbarians,'’ said he, “who despise the flne arts, and 
shut up women, ought to be exterminated. It is fit 
for a heroine to punish them for their want of deference 
to the sex." When in the first^year of the war, Choc- 
zim was taken by the Russians, “Oh! Minerva of 
the North," cried Voltaire, “avenge the Greeks; I go 
to meet you on the plains of Marathon." “ It is not 
enough that the Turks should be humbled," thus he 
cheered on the empress; “ their empire in Europe must 
be annihilated. They must be banished and, for ever, to 
Asia." He sounded “ the tocsin of kings," in which 
he devoted the Ottoman race to ruin; advocating a 
war of extermination sometimes with fanatical fervor, 
sometimes with jests and gallantry. AU Europe ap¬ 
plauded without asking if the design was just, or if 
Russian despotism was less oppressive than the Turkish. 
Religious sympathy was awakened; a hostile feeling to 


358 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


a foreign race revived; and the thought of the resto¬ 
ration of Greece captivated the imagination. 

Connexions were formed with the insurgent pacha 
of Egypt; an insurrection was promoted in the Morea; 
the war was carried beyond the Danube into the moun¬ 
tains of Bulgaria, to Chumla, and almost beyond the 
Balkan; while a Russian fleet was despatched from the 
ports of the Baltic to the Cyclades. 

The burning of the Turkish fleet at Tchesme was 
the great event at sea. The Turks had occupied a 
strong position in a strait between the island of Chios 
and the Asiatic coast. Nevertheless, the Russian ad¬ 
miral deemed it fit to make an attack. The flag ship 
of the Russians came into close contact with the largest 
vessel of the Turks. After an obstinate engagement, 
both took Are, and blew up; the officers and a very 
few men only having escaped. Upon this the Turks 
cut their cables and retreated to the small bay of 
Tchesme. Here they were closely huddled together, 
and were immediately blockaded by the Russians. 
Two fire ships were finally brought to communicate 
flames to the Turkish fleet. “The earth and the 
waves,” says Catharine, “trembled from the great 
number of the enemy’s vessels which were blown up. 
The sound reached to Smyrna, a distance of nearly 
forty miles. The morning after the conflagration, the 
water in the harbor of Tchesme was tinged vdth blood, 
so many Turks had perished.” And she adds, “ as for 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


359 


the taking of Constantinople, I do not believe it so near; 
yet we must despair of nothing.” A few days after, 
still dwelling on these scenes of horror, she expresses her 
fear, that her deeds in war may seem fabulous to pos¬ 
terity. “Yet a little more of this good fortune and 
the history of the Turks will furnish a new subject for 
tragedy to future ages.” She had told the defender of 
toleration that twenty thousand Mussulmen had per¬ 
ished, and now she writes, “Really I think with you, 
that it will soon be time for me to go study Greek at 
some university.” 

By land, Romanzoff overran Moldavia and Walla- 
chia in 1770, after conquering, on the river Kagul, 
150,000 Turks, with an anny of but fifteen thousand 
Russians. In 1771, Dolgoruki succeeded in subdu¬ 
ing the Crimea which the Russians called Taiuida, 
and was rewarded with the name of Krimski. You 
will keep the Tauric Chersonesus,” said Voltaire; “ but 
if you make peace now, what will become of my poor 
Greece.” “ If the war continues,” \vrote the empress, 
“ there will be nothing left for us to take but Byzan¬ 
tium, and in truth I begin to think that that is not 
impossible.” 

Charmed with the flattery of the greatest writer of 
the age, she beheved in his visions of Olympian games 
to be established anew, of Attica rising up again in its 
ancient glory. A design for a medal, to celebrate the 
taking of Constantinople, was got ready in anticipa- 


360 


STUDIES IN HISTOEY. 


tion; she would say, half in jest, half in earnest, “We 
wiU have the ancient Greek tragedies enacted by 
Grecian players on the theatre of Athens; ’’ and as 
for the road from Moscow to Corinth, she had traced 
it with her own hand on her maps. “ But after all,” 
said she as her finances became impaired, “I must 
practise moderation, and say peace is better than the 
finest war in the world.” The year 1773 passed in 
negotiations. 

There was not one of the European powers that 
was willing to see the downfall of the Porte; but the 
English Ministry could not interfere, for it gave all its 
energies to the repression of the spirit of liberty in 
America; and was led by its jealousy of Erance to 
seek the most intimate political connexion with Russia. 
Erance was paralysed by the abject vices of her sove¬ 
reign. The king of Prussia clearly discerned how 
adverse to his own interest would be the increase of 
his neighbor, but he was bound by a treaty of alliance 
to which he remained faithful. Austria alone under¬ 
took to prevent Russian aggrandizement at the expense 
of Turkey. 

On the sixth of July, 1771, her ambassador. Von 
Thugut, signed at Constantinople a secret convention, 
by which Austria, taking advantage of the necessities 
of the Porte, made valuable acquisitions of money, 
land, and commercial privileges, and in consideration 
of these advantages, promised jointly with the.Porte to 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 361 


compel Russia to return all the Turkish provinces she 
had conquered, and to secure the independence and 
freedom of the repubhc of Poland, which would then 
be a wall between Russia and the Porte. All the 
while that in his negotiations with the Porte he was 
assuming such obhgations of hostihty to Russia, he 
was using towards that power the strongest assurances 
of friendship, and engaged, with certain conditions, to 
use his influence to procure for Russia an advantageous 
peace. Meantime, the convention was kept a secret for 
several months; and Austria received a very accept¬ 
able strip of land as well as a large sum of money, 
which was welcome to an exhausted treasury. 

Hardly were these advantages secured from the 
Porte, when Kaunitz, allured by the prospect of large 
acquisitions from Poland, came to an understanding 
with Russia, and expressed a willingness to assent to 
those conditions of peace which Catharine desired. 
Only he gave the crafty counsel, that she should first 
make much more severe requisitions than she designed 
to insist upon, to which Austria might earnestly 
object. Then by degrees the terms being made milder, 
as if by Austrian influence, both powers were to unite 
in pressmg them upon the Porte. 

The plan for jointly plundering Turkey as well as 
Poland, was made just six months after the convention 
by which Austria had pledged herself to take part with 
the Porte till all its possessions should be recovered. 


362 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


The sympathy expressed by the European powers 
in behalf of Turkey, served only to confirm it in 
its disinclination to peace, and active operations were 
earnestly renewed. “ You will take Byzantium,’’ wrote 
Voltaire to the empress, “and you will cause the 
(Edipus of Sophocles to be played at Athens.” “ If 
the Turks continue the war,” answered Catharine, 
“ your wishes to see us upon the Bosphorus will be very 
near their fulfilment.” In 1773 active operations were 
renewed in good earnest. Romanzoff crossed the 
Danube, which no Russian army had done beforo for 
eight hundred years. Yet he was obhged to retreat 
with great loss. The next year saw him again beyond 
the Danube; winning victories, and cutting ofi* all com¬ 
munication between the grand vizier at Chumla and 
Constantinople. Meantime, the persevering Mustapha 
had been gathered to his fathers, and was succeeded by 
the imbecile Abdul Hamid. The grand vizier had no 
means of defence; his troops, in their fury, only mas¬ 
sacred each other. The refigious warlike enthusiasm 
of the Ottomans seemed to be extinct, under rulers 
educated in the seraglio to indulgence, not to the labors 
of government. On the twenty-first of July, 1774, 
sixty-three years almost to a day after the unfortunate 
treaty, by which Peter the Great had saved himself 
from a ruinous captivity, Romanzoff was able to dictate a 
peace, which was hastily signed in the Russian camp 
at Kutchuk-Kainardghi. 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


363 


Its conditions were of the utmost importance in 
themselves and in their consequences. 1. The Tartars 
in the Crimea and the Kuban were to be independent, 
under Russian protection. 2. The Porte retained 
Moldavia and Wallachia, but Russia reserved the right 
of interfering, by its ambassadors at Constantinople, in 
their concerns. 3. Russia retained, of its conquests, 
Kinburn and Azoph, and important fortresses in the 
Crimea. 4. Commercial freedom was secm’ed to the 
Russians in the Euxine, and in all the Turkish waters. 

Thus ended the six years’ contest. The coast from 
the mouth of the Dnieper to the Kuban, was now 
either Russian, or at the mercy of Russia. The Dar¬ 
danelles were open to its fleets, and the Euxine free to 
its commerce. 

The peace of Kainardghi had been dictated by 
Catharine, unrestrained by any foreign mediation. At 
the close of it, she found herself the arbitress of the 
interests of the northern nations; an object of distrust 
to the Swedish Gustavus; and of apprehension to the 
aged Frederic; while the Austrian emperor courted 
her alhance, and the remnant of Poland was swayed 
by her influence. By a wise organization of the states 
of her boundless einpue, she brought its entire re¬ 
sources 'within her immediate and easy control; its 
moral strength was vastly increased by her arms; and 
now that her generals had been successful in Em’ope 
and Asia Minor, her imperial vanity aspired to the dis- 


364 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


tinction of legislating for the high seas, and protecting 
the rights of neutral flags against the aggressions of 
maritime tyranny. Is it strange, then, that her mind 
should have still fed on the hope of restoring the 
Byzantine empire ? Is it wonderful, that she should 
have aspired to connect herself with classic associations, 
and have enjoyed, in anticipation, the flatteries that 
would have waited on the female restorer of Greece, 
and the female conqueror of Byzantium ? Up to the 
last year of his hfe, Voltaire continued to use aU his 
arts of flattery to animate her purpose. The secret,’’ 
said he, ‘‘of sending the Turks back to the coun¬ 
tries from which they came, is reserved for the flrst 
woman of the human race, whose name is Catharine.” 
And he offers to prostrate himself at her feet, and in 
his dying agony to implore victory for her arms. 

The success of her flrst war with the Porte fiUed 
Catharine with an exalted idea of her superior re¬ 
sources; and she continued to aspire to an immor¬ 
tality of glory for her own name, by establishing a 
Greek or Oriental Empire. During her hfe it was her 
intention herself to govern this new dominion, together 
with her possessions at the North; and to bequeath 
the latter to her grandson Alexander, the former to 
Constantine. The names of the children were tokens 
of the high destiny that was preparing for them. 
Constantine, from his birth, was treated as the future 
emperor of Greece and the East. He was baptized 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 365 

according to the rites of the Oriental Greek Church, 
which differ somewhat from the Russian, and he had 
Grecian nurses and attendants from the Archipelago. 
Accident prevented his being nursed with Grecian 
milk, but Grecian sounds were among the first which 
he heard. He was called the Star of the East, and 
while yet a child, Greeks were admitted to his presence 
to do him homage. 

But before engaging in a new war with the Turks, 
Catharine secured the benefits of the recent pacification. 
For the dominion of the Black Sea, the possession of 
the Crimea was deemed essential; and now the last 
shade of the successors of Genghis, the former triumph¬ 
ant lord of Russia, was to surrender his sceptre into 
the hands of the empress. 

In the treaty of Kainardghi, both parties bound 
themselves in the most solemn manner, not to interfere, 
on any pretext whatever, in the internal concerns of 
the Crimea. Yet hardly had the parchments been in¬ 
terchanged, before Russia was already busy with its 
intrigues. France was interested in behalf of the 
Porte; both because it furnished occupation to her 
enemies, and stfil more, for the immense injury which 
her commerce would sustain by its ruin. Into all the 
Turkish possessions the French might import and 
export every kind of raw or manufactured product, 
paying a duty nominally of tliree, actually of two and 
a half per cent. Not only other nations, the Turks 


366 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


themselves paid a double, and on some things, a 
threefold greater duty. The coasting trade on the 
Turkish coast ’was carried on in Trench ships, free 
from any duty or tax whatever. The Trench residing 
in Turkey, stood under the sole jurisdiction of their 
own state. The commerce with Trance was constantly 
on the increase. At the beginning of the eighteenth 
century the annual exports from Turkey to Trance 
amounted to about two millions of livres; but in the 
middle of that century to twenty-two millions; and in 
the year 1786 to thirty-eight millions eight hundred 
thousand livres. 

The diplomatic relations of the European powers 
were at this time exceedingly complex. Prussia had an 
intimate alliance with Russia, and having faithfully ful¬ 
filled its obhgations in the first war between Russia 
and Turkey, believed itself now fairly entitled to a 
reciprocity of favor, to which it was reluctant to relin¬ 
quish its claim. But Austria, moved by the prospect of 
aggrandizement alike in Bavaria and in European 
Turkey, unfolded itself from the embrace of Trance, 
and feU into the toils of Russia; Trance, left thus 
alone, endeavored to form a new combination with 
Prussia, which must first set itself free from its 
Northern ally. But insuperable difficulties stood in 
the way of this last combination. 

The principal aim of Trance was, to defeat the 
schemes of aggrandizement formed by Russia and Aus- 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 367 


tria; the principal aim of Frederic, to dissolve the union 
between France and Austria, and tiU there should be a 
rupture between those powers, he was too cautious to 
trust himseK in an aUiance with France. Yet while he 
avoided appearing to counteract the schemes of Cath¬ 
arine, he commanded his charge d'affaires at Con¬ 
stantinople, Baron von Gaffron, not to lose a good 
opportunity of stirring up the Porte to resist the 
ceding of the Crimea to Russia, provided he could 
do so without danger of being discovered. Accord¬ 
ingly the envoy indited a most private memoire for 
the Turkish minister, and gave it to his drogoman to 
translate and deliver. The drogoman, being bribed, 
gave the memoire to the Russian ambassador. To 
justify himself against complaint and preserve the 
appearance of innocence, Frederic dismissed Von 
Gafifron from office, and put him in prison. Such 
were the contingencies of European diplomacy. Its 
morality resembled the Spartan principle about steal¬ 
ing. To play a double part was held a duty; to be 
discovered, a crime. 

While negotiations were conducted with careful 
reserve between the Prussian and French govern¬ 
ments, the courts of Vienna and Petersburgh were 
not less active, though their progress towards an 
alliance met with serious difficulties. To Catharine 
the expulsion of the Turks was the great purpose; 
to Joseph the Second it was a secondary consideration. 


368 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


to be made subservient to his views on Bavaria and 
elsewhere in the West. He acceded to the Russian 
policy to oblige the empress, that so the empress 
might in turn favor him. He did not beheve suc¬ 
cess against the Turks so sure or easy as was 
imagined; and acknowledged also, that the Austrian 
interest would suffer from the capture of Constan¬ 
tinople by his northern rival. 

While the great continental powers were wavering 
in their choice of alliances, Catharine gained possession 
of the Crimea. The convention of the tenth of March, 
1779, confirmed in the most solemn manner the inde¬ 
pendence of this sovereign state. No foreign power 
should, under any circumstances whatever, demand of 
it an account of its actions; Russia and the Porte 
each promised, by all that they acknowledged as holy, 
never, under any pretence, to interfere in its concerns. 
The spiritual supremacy of the Grand Seignior was 
recognised, but was never to extend to other relations. 
Should either party by any unforeseen accident become 
entangled in the concerns of the Tartars, it was agreed, 
that no step should be taken by it without consulting 
the other. 

Notwithstanding these obligations, Catharine took 
part in the troubles which soon broke out in the 
Crimea. The new khan, Schahin Gheray, was de¬ 
voted to the Russian empress, and trusting in her 
protection, imposed unwonted burdens, violated estab- 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 369 


lished usages, and pretended to be greatly enamored 
of European culture. To diffuse this in all its lustre, 
he formed the resolution of having the large French 
Encyclopedia translated into the Tartar language. His 
authority did not last long enough to execute his pur¬ 
pose ; and when Catharine was mistress of the destiny 
of the Tartars, in a better spirit of toleration, she had 
a beautiful edition of the Koran printed for the benefit 
of her Mahometan subjects. 

The Tartars revolted, and transferred their alle¬ 
giance to Dewlet Gheray. The Russians had not yet 
withdrawn their forces; the Turks, therefore, felt 
themselves justified in sending troops to Taman, to 
reheve those who were suffering for their religious 
faith. This served Russia as a pretext for hostilities, 
and Prince Potemkin undertook to conduct the affair 
to its completion. Potemkin, the most powerful man 
in Russia, was little suited to concihate either love or 
esteem. The Grand Duke, the Count Panin, and other 
noblemen of the empire detested him. By persuading 
Catharine that his services were indispensable to her 
security, rather than by the influence of attachment, he 
gained entire sway over the empress and the state, and 
retained it till his death. He had no distinguished 
talents as a commander; yet the whole army was 
under his control; and all the generals of greatest 
experience and fame were subject to his caprice. He 
understood but imperfectly the foreign relations of his 
24 


370 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


country or tlie wants of the interior; and yet it was he 
who dictated to the vanity of the empress the measures 
to he adopted within her immense dominions or towards 
foreign powers. Without elevated ambition of any 
kind, it never occmred to him, that he could do good 
to mankind by wisely guiding the affairs of that large 
portion that depended on him. To him nothing was 
nobler than the honors that dazzle the beholder; his 
whole soul was in the gratification of his vanity. He 
prided himself on his skill in regulating cavalry, and 
used to boast of his regiment as the finest in the 
universe. His love of display made him fond of giving 
peculiar brilliancy to the ceremonies of the Greek 
Chm’ch. Denying himself nothing, he indulged all 
his whims, and wished to have it known that he could 
do so. This was to him the ^reat purpose of hfe. He 
disregarded distinctions of birth, of rank, of wealth, and 
was always bent on showing that he alone held the 
control. Frederic the Second once directed his ambas¬ 
sador to offer Potemkin his influence in gaining for him 
the crown of Poland; Potemkin replied, that he had 
never dreamed of such a matter, and did not respect 
the Polish nation enough to be willing to be their king. 
He treated the most distinguished foreigners with 
contumely, and listened to the proposals of foreign 
ambassadors with the contemptuous air of one who but 
just condescends to hear the requests of his inferiors 
and dependents. Sated with pleasure, he lavished the 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 371 


public treasure with boundless prodigality in the grati¬ 
fication of his caprices. Catharine anticipated all his 
wants that could be divined, and gave him incredibly 
large sums; nevertheless, he would pervert the funds 
intrusted to him for public purposes, and even forge 
orders of the empress, to get possession of money, 
which he knew to be peculiarly needed by the state. 
Potemkin took bribes from foreign princes to promote 
their objects ; and his views were so contracted, that 
he could not judge of the true interests of the empire. 
He used on all occasions to set in the most ridiculous 
light Prederic’s strict economy and simple mode of 
living; and once when that monarch opposed a second 
division of Poland on account of its injustice, he read 
the king’s letter three several times and then gave it 
back to the Prussian minister with the words, “ I never 
should have believed that King Frederic had such ro¬ 
mantic notions.” 

Though seizing immense treasiwes, which he care¬ 
lessly squandered at the gaming-table or for any fancy, he 
was accustomed never to pay those who furnished him 
with the necessaries of life. Merchants held them¬ 
selves ruined, when an order came to supply the wants 
of Potemkin. He had no sentiment of mercy in his 
nature, and would torment without any object, as if to 
show that he could do so with impunity; and he cared 
as httle for human life as for money, if the waste of it 
pleased his capricious humor. 


372 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


Potemkin has been called a man of colossal great¬ 
ness. But he was in no wise great. His mind was 
low and coarse. He began his career of success hke 
the other favorites, chance having made him knovm to 
the empress; and he confirmed his power by im¬ 
pudence, and insensibility to moral feeling and honor. 
He cared neither for exercising a wide influence over 
the destinies of men, nor for gaining an immortality of 
fame; but wished to live in splendor, have aU near him 
at his feet, and prove himself to be lifted above every 
motive to fear. Such was the man who was employed 
to annex the Crimea. 

“ Blood and booty ’’ were the watchwords, as Po¬ 
temkin pom^ed the Russian army into the heart of the 
dominions of the khan. Thousands of families were 
destroyed, or carried away into bondage in remote 
Russian provinces; till finally, the khan and some 
of the royal tribe declared ‘'their conviction, that 
happiness could be found only under the mild gov¬ 
ernment of the empress, and that they therefore 
submitted themselves and their nation uncondition¬ 
ally and for ever to her authority.” On the eighth 
of April, 1783, the empress issued her manifesto, 
that for sundry reasons therein given, “ she had 
been induced to receive under her authority the pen¬ 
insula of the Crimea, Kuban, and the island Taman. 
Her new subjects were exhorted to fidelity and obe- 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 373 


dience.” The oath of allegiance to the empress was 
administered; every refusal was punished with death. 

As if nothing had happened, Catharine taking ad¬ 
vantage of the alarm of the Porte at her alliance with 
Austria, directly proposed and extorted a treaty of 
commerce and amity with Turkey, on conditions most 
favorable to Russia. Hardly had this been effected, 
when she proceeded still further, and demanded of the 
Porte a recognition of her sovereignty over the Crimea; 
threatening war, and Austria joining her in the threat, 
if she received a refusal. The Porte yielded, and the 
river Kuban became the acknowledged boundary be¬ 
tween the Turkish and Russian empires. 

Thus Russia tore from the Porte the granary of 
Constantinople, and an outpost which had been im¬ 
portant as a resource in war, capable of furnishing 
excellent soldiers. This province became at once of 
vast importance to Russia, for it afforded the means 
of conducting the most extensive commerce. But 
Catharine and Potemkin both valued it chiefly as the 
preparation for fimther conquest. At the mouth of 
the Dnieper the empress caused a new city, Cherson, 
to be built. The conquests received their ancient 
name, the Tauric Chersonesus, or Taurida, and Potem¬ 
kin, who obtained the appellation of the Taurian, as¬ 
sumed the charge of changing the Tartars into good 
Russian subjects. In the execution of his office he 


374 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


knew no purpose beyond gratifying his own rapacity 
and the vanity of the empress. Constitution, manners, 
and established customs were despised; justice was 
made a matter of purchase; the wealthy were plun¬ 
dered ; many fled; many were driven into other Rus¬ 
sian provinces; and foreigners were indiscriminately 
invited from all quarters. In former times, the Tartar 
khan had joined the Turkish army with fifty thousand 
well equipped horsemen; two years after the land had 
become an integral part of the Russian empire, the 
census of all the male inhabitants is said to have 
amounted to but seventeen thousand. 

In 1787, Catharine made to this part of her 
dominions a journey which resembled a continued 
triumphal procession. Potemkin wished to exhibit 
proofs of the rapid prosperity of the Chersonesus, and 
the newly acquired provinces. Palaces were therefore 
erected, though to be occupied but for a night; signs 
of apparent prosperity and contentment were every 
where hung out for show; towns were built and 
people assembled to play the part of inhabitants ; then 
the houses were left vacant, and the same people, 
having been carried forward by night, showed them¬ 
selves on the next day, ready to act the same thing 
over on another spot. Music and dances enlivened 
the hours; the plains, over which the Tartars had so 
recently sped their coursers amidst the loneliness 
of rude nature, resounded with strange notes of 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


375 


mirtli, and glittered with the splendors of imperial 
magnificence. The deputies of a hundred subject 
nations stayed the steps of the Semiramis of the North, 
who was come to receive their homage. The king 
of Poland made his appearance to gaze at the novel 
spectacle. Joseph the Second also hurried all the way 
from Vienna to behold the show, and the newly built 
city, Cherson, became brilliant with splendid festivals, 
given in honor of his arrival. Never had the banks 
of a river flowing through a wildemess been made the 
scene of such revelry. And here in the sohtary city 
of the desert, intoxicated with triumph, viewing mth 
contempt the withered energies of the Porte, and hold¬ 
ing out greedy hands to seize on new diadems, the 
German emperor and the Russian czarina perfected 
their scheme for the dissolution of the Turkish empire, 
and divided in anticipation their future conquests, 
inscribing over one of the gates of Cherson, “ This is 
the way to Byzantium.” “The Crimea,” we quote 
from a confidential letter, which Joseph IL, immedi¬ 
ately after his visit to that province, wrote to his own 
minister, Kamiitz, “ Taurida, has not any thing so very 
remarkable. But nevertheless, the advantages which 
Russia derives from the acquisition of this province, 
are very important. It can reduce the Osmanlis to 
extremities, after the destruction of their fleet; it can 
make Stamboul tremble; it gains the way to Paros 
and the Hellespont; but there I must by all means 


376 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


come first on the side of Rumelia.” The Austrian 
emperor read the book of futurity well; but it was 
only a glance of fruitless covetousness, which he was 
allowed to cast on Rumelia and the Hellespont. 

VII. 

The Porte was the aggressor in the seventh war, 
which in August, 1787, the year of Catharine’s visit to 
Cherson, was declared against its overshadowing neigh¬ 
bor, and began with unusually favorable auspices. 
Asia poured out its thousands to be arranged under 
the banners of the grand vizier, and ahnost ten thou¬ 
sand seamen had been impressed from the islands 
of the Archipelago alone. The army of the Turks 
amounted to about 450,000 men, of whom about one 
half were cavahy. Russia and Austria were, indeed, in 
union; but Poland, now in a state of anarchy and civil 
feuds, engaged the immediate attention, and divided the 
ambition of Catharine; Sweden assumed a lowering 
aspect; England and Prussia were averse to the 
diminution of the Ottoman power; the reforms of 
Joseph II. were exciting discontents throughout his 
dominions; and the Russian empress would gladly 
have avoided a rupture, and foregone the gorgeous 
vision of a Grecian empire. 

The war opened with attempts of the Turks to 
recover Kinburn, and thus reconquer the Crimea. 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 377 


But Suwarrow was there, and their enthusiasm was 
fruitless. Once, indeed, during the attack, the Rus¬ 
sians were obliged to fly; but Suwarrow, who was in 
the foremost ranks, galloped after the fugitives, and 
throwing himself upon the earth, cried out, “ Run, ye 
rascals, do but run ; here will I alone be cut in pieces.” 
Fired by his words, the Russians rallied, the front was 
formed anew, and the enemy’s troops were dislodged 
from their intrenchments with the loss of all but about 
five hundred men. This was the only occasion, during 
the war, on which the Turks were able to act as aggres¬ 
sors. 

The Austrian campaign of 1788 was one of great 
loss and disgrace. Joseph II., with a passion for being 
esteemed a great warrior, had not one of the qualities 
of a general; neither coolness, nor prompt decision, 
nor firmness. A mistaken humanity left his army 
to waste away by disease, without imdertaking any 
decisive exploit; and he is supposed to have lost 
more men from his tenderness and irresolution, than a 
bolder commander would have done in an active cam¬ 
paign. 

The emperor was always employed, by day with 
the concerns of war, by night with the civil adminis¬ 
tration. He exposed his o^vn person fearlessly, but 
spared his troops. His care for their supphes was 
exemplary. His own dress was simple ; his table 


378 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


frugally supplied; and, as for his lodging, he some¬ 
times occupied an ordinary hut, sometnnes slept upon 
the ground. He made every personal sacrifice; but 
the gallantry of his officers did not save him from the 
results of his own want of judgment. The emperor 
expected confidently a battle and a victory; and in¬ 
stead of it, on the night following the twentieth of Sep¬ 
tember, he was involved in a disorderly retreat, which 
quenched his military vanity, destroyed his reputation 
as a commander, and left in him the seeds of a mortal 
disease. 

Quite difierent were the results in Moldavia, where 
the Austrians, under Coburg, united with the Russians, 
and reduced Choczim. Meantime, the attention of 
Potemkin had been directed to Otchakov, at the mouth 
of the Dnieper. In the naval battles which preceded 
the siege, Paul Jones acted as rear-admiral, and ad¬ 
vanced his fame for coolness, intrepidity, and skill. 
The possession of the place itself was important to 
Russia, for its recent acquisitions would thus be effec¬ 
tually secured from attack. It was at last, after a siege 
of nearly six months, taken by storm on the seven¬ 
teenth of December, the day of St. Nicholas. It cost 
the lives of about 9,500 Turks and of 2,700 Russians. 
The Russians obtained the entire mastery of the city in 
about one hour and a quarter; and it has ever since 
constituted a portion of the Russian empire. 

In the midst of this victorious career, Gustavus III., 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


379 


instigated in part by his own ambition, in part by Eng¬ 
land and Prussia, made a sudden, and, to Catharine, a 
most unexpected attack on Russia. This invasion 
divided the forces of the empress, but was resisted with 
admirable dignity; and after a conflict of more than 
two years, she compelled her voluntary aggressor to 
recede. All the while the war against Turkey was 
continued without interruption. 

The campaign of 1789 was attended by great 
results both for Austria and Russia. Gallatz, Acker- 
mann, and Bender, were taken by the latter. But the 
great event of the campaign, was the battle of Mar- 
tinestie, on the Rimnik, in which about 21,000 Rus¬ 
sians and Austrians, after a fierce strife of eleven hours, 
gained an entire victory over an army of nearly 100,000 
Turks. Prince Coburg had been nearly surrounded. 
He wrote a despatch to Suwarrow, and desired him to 
effect a junction. Suwarrow tore a scrap from the 
letter, scrawled the words, “ Pll come,” and in a 
twinkling sent the messenger back, following just in 
time to be present at the engagement. The prince 
soHcited him to allow his troops some rest before fight¬ 
ing. “ My men,” replied he, “ need no repose ; St. 
Nicholas before me, myself following the saint, and my 
soldiers following me, let us attack the foe.” The vic¬ 
tory was one of the- greatest ever gained by an Austrian 
general, and was won by a wise disposition of the artil¬ 
lery, and extraordinary coolness and rapidity in con- 


380 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


centrating forces on the disputed points. Coburg 
spent the winter in Bucharest. Loudon, on the other 
side, succeeded in taking Belgrade; the siege of Or- 
sova was commenced, and the year came to an end 
under circumstances which seemed to leave hardly one 
strong place, or one effectual barrier, between Belgrade 
and Constantinople. 

The death of Joseph II., in the spring of 1790, left 
Russia to continue her career of victory alone. Not 
daunted by the desertion of its ally, Potemkin com¬ 
pleted the conquest of Bessarabia. The object of the 
Russians, in this campaign, was to defend the Crimea, 
and by driving the Turks from the right bank of the 
Danube, to gain the ability of prescribing the terms of 
peace. To this end Kdianova was taken, and the 
mouth of the Danube occupied, and at last the siege of 
Ismail was regularly commenced by the main army of 
the Russians under Potemkin. It had lasted more 
than seven months, and little impression was made. 
Potemkin was with his women, who amused them¬ 
selves by drawing cards and telling fortunes. “ I pre¬ 
dict,’' said one of them to him, ‘‘ you will take Ismail 
in ten days.”—I know an oracle much nearer than 
that,” said Potemkin, and issued an order to Suwarrow 
to take it within three. On the evening before the 
storming, Suwarrow addressed the troops in these 
words : “ To-morrow early, an hour before day, I shall 
get up, shall say my prayers, wash myself, dress myself. 


THE WAI^ OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


381 


then I shall crow like a cock, and do you storm accord¬ 
ing to my directions.’’ It was done. The Russians lost 
15,000 men in the assault of the city and avenged their 
loss in the blood of 35,000 Turks. The Russian eagle 
was finally planted in triumph on its walls, and Suwar- 
row obtained a glory for the massacre of myriads, far 
transcending that of the bloody Poliorcetes of antiquity. 

At the negotiations for peace the diplomacy of 
Russia and Austria were in contrast. A few months 
before the death of Joseph II., Prussia formed a strict 
alliance with the Porte, and assumed a menacing 
attitude towards Austria. Thus, when Leopold II. 
came to the throne of Austria, he found a hostile 
spirit in Prussia, already ripe for action; Hungary 
was still heaving with discontent ; the Austrian 
Netherlands were in open revolt; in various parts 
of his states, dissatisfaction prevailed; the season was 
one of scarcity; the finances were exhausted; his 
own election as emperor of Germany not having 
been secured, the German empire was without a head; 
Prance was in a state of revolution, which foreboded a 
general crisis; and England held a peace as the price 
of its friendship. Besides, he was himself of a mild 
character, and mlling to give repose to the many 
nations which now acknowledged his sway. At the 
congress of Reichenbach, which opened in 1790, Prus¬ 
sia, England, and Holland, as mediating powers, dictated 
to Leopold the strict status quo as the condition of the 


382 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


peace, which was concluded in the following year be¬ 
tween Austria and the Porte. What a contrast with 
the proud anticipations of Joseph II., but three years 
before, in his interviews with Catharine at Cherson ! 
He had wasted the strength of his empire, sacrificed 
his reputation as a military man, and prepared his OAvn 
grave, without securing to his successor one single ad¬ 
vantage, or bringing to reahty any one of his schemes. 

Deserted by Austria, Russia was left alone. Swe¬ 
den had been let loose upon her from the north; Pitt 
equipped a fleet to give force to the intervention of 
England; Prussia had undertaken the guarantee of 
the possessions of Turkey; Prance and Spain, so long 
as they could, had likewise been active against the 
empress; her treasury was exhausted; her general¬ 
issimo, Potemkin, enfeebled and dying; and, what 
interested the cabinet of Petersburgh most of all, 
the anarchy of Poland had reached its crisis. Yet 
in the midst of all these difficulties, the empress 
maintained her purpose of terminating the contest 
without foreign mediation. Preliminaries were signed 
in August, 1791, and were changed into a definite 
peace in January, 1792. Russia kept possession of 
the district between the Dnieper and the Dniester, 
retained the Crimea and Kuban, and on these condi¬ 
tions, consented to restore all other conquests. So 
lightly did Catharine, even while she longed for peace, 
hold the threats of England and the guaranties of 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


383 


Prussia. Thus did she secure to her empire all the 
coast from the Kuban to the Dniester, and annex to it 
the deserts, where Odessa was soon to bloom. 

Count Suwarrow, who with Potemkin conducted 
the Russian armies during the war, was one of the 
extraordinary men of his age. If he had not conjoined 
the talent of inspiring unlimited confidence, his man¬ 
ners would have made him pass for a whimsical 
bufibon; and had he not been successful, he would 
have been known only for foolhardiness and savage 
intrepidity. He was a powerful instrument in the 
hands of others; a soldier panting for bloodshed and 
the honors of victory; at Ismail, Warsaw, and among 
the Alps, alike indifferent to the cause which he de¬ 
fended, or the lives which he sacrificed. He possessed 
the great qualities of a soldier; a keen eye, sagacity, 
prompt decision, and unsuspected fearlessness. His 
motto was, “Forwards and fight.” “A general,” he 
would say, “ should be at the head of an army, not at 
its tail; ” and on the day of battle, he might be found 
in the very hottest of the fray. He was of a restless 
and feverish activity; and in Italy, the French found 
him equally fertile in invention and alert in execution. 

His wrath was fierce and ungovernable, sometimes 
bitterly insolent, sometimes passionately cruel. Yet he 
loved freedom of speech in his intercourse vnth. others; 
and it is related of him, that one day when in a 
gust of anger he was beating a soldier unmercifully, a 


384 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


young officer, who stood near, cried out, “ The field- 
marshal Suwarrow commands us not to give way to 
our anger.’' “ The field-marshal Suwarrow must be 
obeyed,” replied he, and stopped cudgeUing imme¬ 
diately. In his habits he was an ascetic. He slept on 
straw, or on hay, even in the period of his princely 
fortunes. Whatever furniture he found in a room 
which he was to occupy, he was apt to dash in pieces. 
Especially he would break all mirrors. Sometimes he 
would take out the mndows ; ‘‘ Suwarrow is not afraid 
of cold.” Sometimes he would unhinge the doors and 
throw them away; ‘‘Nobody dares come into the 
same apartment with Suwarrow.” ITe respected Rus¬ 
sian usages. When Paul vdshed to change the uniform 
of the Russian troops, and introduce the custom of 
wearing long hair, Suwarrow would not co-operate in 
effecting the change. “ Cues are not pikes, nor curls 
cannon,” was his justification. On Sundays and on 
hohdays he would read to his men out of books of de¬ 
votion ; was himself exact in the duty of prayer; and 
if he met a monk or a priest, would kiss his hands 
and beg a blessing. He never gave the signal for 
battle without making the sign of the cross, and kiss¬ 
ing the image of St. Nicholas. He would worship 
relics; drink consecrated water; and eat consecrated 
bread, yet with such gestures and grimaces, that his 
devotion seemed the display of a merry-andr^^w. He 
knew how to inspire his soldiers with a national fanat- 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


385 


icism, and made them believe, that if they died in 
fighting his battles, they would immediately return to 
life without grief in the places that were dearest to 
them. In his speech, Suwarrow was blunt and odd; 
was fond of short, pithy sayings; and occasionally 
issued orders in doggrel rhyme. Even his reports 
and despatches to the empress were sometimes written 
in a sort of jingle. His public honors were as sin¬ 
gular as his character. Beside magnificent presents 
of diamonds, of which the iU-dressed warrior was very 
proud, Catharine rewarded him, after the Roman 
fashion, with the surname of Rimnitskij and Paul 
made him a prince, with the name of Italinski, just 
as Scipio of old took the name of Afiicanus, from the 
scene of his victories. An imperial ukase was also 
issued, proclaiming him the greatest general of all 
time. And yet to us Suwarrow seems no better than 
an inferior Attila, who only needed to possess undis¬ 
puted power over another race of Huns, to have swept 
from the world the fairest monuments of civil hberty. 
His memory is perpetuated by the massacres of Ismail 
and Praga; and Carnage may claim him as her favor¬ 
ite son. 

VIII. 

We have spoken thus far only of wars between the 
Turks and Russians. Did they never, during then- 
long course of existence, range themselves in union 

under the same banners ? Has the silver crescent on 
25 


386 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


its shield of green, never once been raised in harmony 
with the triple crown of the two-headed eagle? 
Among the countless variety of human interests, was 
there never one in which the ambition of both powers 
found a common purpose ? Once, and yet only once, 
the armies of the Czar and the caliph met in alliance, 
achieved a joint victory and entered a city in company 
and in triumph, to restore an exiled sovereign. That 
city was Rome; that sovereign was the Pope. An Eng¬ 
lish squadron appeared in the harbor of Civita Vecchia, 
while Russians and Turks assisted at the siege of 
Ancona. Success ensued on each side of the Ap¬ 
ennines, till all three nations, as they advanced from 
either shore, assembled in the Eternal City; and Enghsh, 
Russians, and Turks, heretics, schismatics, and unbe- 
hevers, conspired to restore the apostolic see. 

The last war of the Porte against Catharine had 
cost the sublime sultan the lives of more than a miOion 
of men, had spread discontent through his provinces, 
and, finally, as we have seen, but for the influence of 
Prussia on Austria, and but for the more inviting scene 
of conquest opened in Poland, would have left his em¬ 
pire at the mercy of the victor. Eor some years, the 
policy of Prance and England, and, we may add, 
of Russia, towards the sovereign of Constantino¬ 
ple, was singularly wavering. A series of revolu¬ 
tions in the heart of Europe, far beyond the reach or 
the cognizance of the Ottoman divan, had recovered 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 387 

Egypt from French dominion, and had contributed to 
the erection of the republic of the seven islands, under 
the protection of the Porte, and the guarantee of 
Russia. At times, the three great powers, within 
the short space of seven or eight years, stood, each 
for itself, in a hostile attitude towards the sultan; 
and, during the same period, had vied with each other 
in courting his friendship, and offering strict guaran¬ 
tees of his entire possessions. 

The peace of Presburgh, in 1805, between Austria 
and France, gave up to Napoleon the province of Dal¬ 
matia, bordering on the Turkish empire, and made the 
condition of that empire more precarious than ever. 
Yet, in the following year, the divan, influenced by 
the successes of the French in the north of Europe, 
abandoned its friendly connexion with Russia, which 
had been renewed but the year before, and, despatch¬ 
ing a splendid embassy to Paris, courted an aUiance 
with France. 

The presence of Sebastiani in Constantinople made 
the influence of Napoleon paramount; and brought in 
its train the hostihty of England. France and Tur¬ 
key having formed a connexion, England and Russia 
were driven to an aUiance by a common repulsion. 
When hostihties between France and Prussia were 
renewed, Russia’s armies invaded Moldavia without 
any previous announcement, and in the same year, 


388 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


1806, entered Bucharest in triumph; while the insur¬ 
gent Servians attacked and took Belgrade. 

The divan made a formal declaration of war, the 
eighth against Bussia, on the seventh of January, 
1807 ; and, encouraged by the rapid victories of 
Napoleon, prohibited to all vessels the navigation 
tlirough the Dardanelles. The blow was aimed at 
Great Britain, and brought a British fleet into the 
harbor of Constantinople. The Enghsh admiral de¬ 
manded the surrender of the castles of the Dardanelles, 
the surrender of the Turkish navy of twenty-one 
ships of the line, a declaration of war against Prance, 
and the cession of Moldavia and Wallachia to Russia. 
Bailing at Constantinople, the fleet withdrew, and sub¬ 
sequently made an adventurous and ultimately fruitless 
invasion of Egypt. 

But the course of the war was to be influenced by 
other events than the issue of Russian and Turkish 
arms. Of the fifteen grand sultans of the eighteenth 
century, Selim 111. was the most intelligent. He 
knew the weakness of his empire, but desired to 
renovate it. Peter I. of Russia had moulded the 
rising energies of a nation; Selim Ill. had the harder 
task to check decay. Deficient in firmness of char¬ 
acter, he adopted a partial reform. He left to the 
janizaries their strength, but formed also an anny, 
which was to exist by the side of the ancient forces, and 
which was disciolined according to the rules of Euro- 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


389 


pean tactics. He was also carried away by a romantic 
admiration for Napoleon; and his intimacy with Sebas- 
tiani, whom he permitted to enter the sacred interior 
of the seraglio, offended the stem pride of the con¬ 
firmed Mahometan bigots. Suddenly, on the twenty- 
eighth of May, 1807, an insurrection began. On the 
twenty-ninth the unhappy Selim endeavored to pacify 
the wild mass of insurgents by concessions, assenting 
even to the death of his ministers who were favorable 
to reform. But he sacrificed his consistency without 
securing his liberty. When the mufti joined in the 
attempt to depose the sovereign, Selim, finding resist¬ 
ance useless, bade adieu to his attendants, and repairing 
to the apartments which were henceforward to be his 
prison, consoled his captivity by singing the story of 
his faU. 

The nephew of Selim, the weak and ignorant 
Mustapha IV., was raised to the throne. The newly 
organized army was disbanded; and a reaction began 
to exterminate every trace of reform. Thus, by an¬ 
archy, and the consequences of the disastrous tumults 
in its interior, the Ottoman state lost the opportunity 
of attacking Russia, at the time when she was suffering 
from the battles of Eylau and Eriedland. 

The peace of Tilsit contained a clause providing 
for an armistice with the Porte. The Russians were 
immediately to evacuate Moldavia and WaQachia, into 
which the Tiuks were not to enter till the conclusion 


390 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


of the peace. In consequence of this clause, Russia 
made a truce at Slohoja with the Porte, on the twenty- 
fourth of August, 1807. But peace did not ensue on 
the armistice, nor did Russia evacuate the provinces. 

The truce continued, as if by common consent, and 
without any express stipulations, till the year 1809. 
During that period, a new, more fatal, and more 
bloody revolution, had sent to the grave every male 
descendant of Osman but one. 

The pacha of Rutschuk, Mustapha Bairactar, a 
personal friend of the deposed monarch, a strenuous ad¬ 
vocate for the party of reform, and enemy to the pre¬ 
vailing system of reaction, determined to set aside the 
effeminate Mustapha IV. and raise Sehm once more to 
power. At Adrianople he was joined by the grand 
vizier; and with about thuty-six thousand men they 
marched upon the capital, under the banner of Ma¬ 
homet. The sultan endeavored to win Bairactar by 
appointing him to the chief command of his armies. 
But the leader of the invasion would not be diverted 
from his purpose. Having first confirmed his military 
strength, he assembled the divan, the mufti, the leader 
of the janizaries, and the ulemas; took from the hes¬ 
itating grand vizier the seals of ofiice and put him in 
chains; and then sent the mufti, and the aga of the 
janizaries, to demand the restoration of the throne to 
Selim. By the advice of the mufti, Mustapha IV. 
immediately ordered Selim to be executed. When 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


391 


Bairactar appeared at the inner gates of the seragho, 
and received the mangled and mutilated corpse of his 
benefactor, whom he had expected to restore, grief 
stayed his revenge but for a moment. Mustapha IV. 
was deposed, and his younger brother Mahmoud 11. 
was girded with the sword of the Prophet. The grand 
vizier and the mufti were thrown into the Bosphorus; 
the chief of the eunuchs, and those who assisted in 
murdering Selim, were hanged. The remains of Se¬ 
lim were interred with great pomp. 

The office of grand vizier was conferred on the 
author of the revolution; and the way seemed open to 
the regeneration of the state. Bairactar enjoined new 
levies and warhke preparations. He restored in the 
army European tactics and discipline; he increased the 
mihtary subordination; he allayed the private feuds of 
the pachas, and made them all swear that they would 
contend only for the defence of the empire. He 
caused the youthful sultan to appear in the divan, 
and take part in the public business; and he spread 
through the provinces a fear which promised the 
restoration of order and the return of security. 

Thus there were two parties at Constantinople. 
The one favored an approximation to European 
culture, and held office under a sultan who was a 
creature of their own. But the advocates of unreformed 
Mahometanism were still secretly active and powerful. 
On the fourteenth of November, the anniversaiy of 


392 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


the day on which the Koran is said to have descended 
from heaven, a counter-revolution was begun. Bair- 
actar, fearing he should be overpowered, put to death 
the late sultan Mustapha IV. and his mother. He was 
himself driven to his own palace; and there, retiring 
to a tower, blew himself into the air; or, as some say, 
was suffocated by the flames. A furious battle was 
fought round the seraglio, between the supporters of the 
ancient and the new order. Thrice the janizaries were 
repelled with a loss of three thousand men. The 
capudan pacha, taking sides with the party for reform, 
bombarded the town. The palace of the sultan took 
fire. The flames spread to the city. At last Mah¬ 
moud II., perhaps deserted by his counsellors, perhaps 
concerned for his life, perhaps seeing no alternative, 
yielded to the rebellion, and promised the janizaries all 
they would ask. 

Thus the great question of a change in the pohtical 
system of the Porte, was decided for the present by an 
insurrection in the streets of Constantinople. The 
fierceness of the contest proved that the friends of 
reform were already numerous; and they fell, rather 
from too great confidence in their strength, and the 
want of ability on the part of the sultan, than from an 
actual inferiority in their resources. The person of the 
monarch was sacred, because he stood alone; the sole 
descendant of the race of Osman; caliph and grand 
sultan without a rival; and at that time "without an 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 393 

heir. The monarch of the Turks, in spite of the insti¬ 
tution of polygamy, was an isolated being. There 
was not on earth one man in whose veins flowed the 
blood of his family. 

A sultan, ruled by a lawless body of military in¬ 
surgents, promised no great display of external strength. 
The congress of Erfurt, and the events which preceded 
it, changed the relative position of the powers of 
Europe. When Erance formed an alliance with Russia, 
the Porte, no longer attracted to Napoleon, was left 
to a new combination with England, with which power 
a treaty was concluded on the fifth of January, 1809. 
The year 1808 had been signalized by a war between 
Gustavus IV. of Sweden and Alexander. The peace 
of 1809 gave to Russia the province of Einland, and 
secured her for ever against invasion from the north. 

Alexander, on his return from Erfurt, opened a 
congress with the Porte. The Turks knew that they 
were abandoned by Erance, when the Russian embassy 
demanded the cession of all the land beyond the 
Danube; but, trusting to the alliance with the Eng¬ 
lish, they ventured to renew the war for three cam¬ 
paigns. The political relations of the great powers 
decided more than battles. The Danube and its 
fortresses offered an obstacle to the Russian arms, far 
less formidable than the mountains of the Haemus. In 
1811, the Russians retreated beyond the Danube; the 
Turks pursued, only to be entirely defeated; and 


894 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


their camp at Rutschuk was taken by storm. This led 
to a peace, for Prance and Russia having again become 
divided, the Porte was swayed by the counsels of Eng¬ 
land ; and in spite of the treaty, by which Prance and 
Austria had mutually guarantied the integrity of the 
dominions of Tm^key, the Pruth and the Danube be¬ 
came the boundaries of Russia, which thus gained 
Bessarabia, and the third part of Moldavia, together 
with the control of the natural channel of Hungarian 
commerce. 


The ninth war between Russia and the Porte, 
declared by Russia in April, 1828, was far less 
protracted than those of the last century. Mag¬ 
nificent hopes of change and appaUing victories had 
prepared its way. It did, indeed, seem at first, 
as if the civilized world were arming its moral force, 
to rescue from an uncertain slavery Christian states 
which had so long been the victims of despotism. 
The insurrection of the Greeks gave a pious aspect 
to the foreign influence which was invoked against 
the ruthless revenge, attending Ottoman successes. 
Philanthropists in both hemispheres almost persuad¬ 
ed themselves that the Turkish sovereignty stood 
arraigned before the grand inquest of nations; the 
sentence of exclusion from the benefit of human 
sympathies was pronounced; and the legions of 4he 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


395 


north were summoned as the ministers of retributive 
justice. 

But as the contest advanced, a consideration of im¬ 
portant interests, such as had led, in the former centu¬ 
ries, to repeated colhsions, began to resume and to 
exercise an overwhelming influence. The eyes of men 
had been dazzled, and their hearts confounded, by the 
protracted wars and intricate negotiations which had 
grown out of the French revolution. That momentous 
event had seemed to interrupt the continuity of his¬ 
tory ; and appeared, like a dark and unexplored gulf, 
separating the past and the future. But at last the 
nations came to be at rest; and even the tremulous 
motions, which had followed the flerce agitation, began 
to be tranquiUized. Old sympathies and objects of 
ambition revived; and purposes, which Russia had for 
more than a century been desirous of executing, were 
hurried to maturity by fortunate circumstances, and a 
dexterous use of unforeseen opportunities. 

Not the failure of an entire comphance with some 
points in the treaty of Bucharest, not the frustrated 
negotiations of Ackermann, not a returning sympathy 
with the subjugated and dismembered kingdom of 
Servia, not an enthusiasm for enfranchising Greece, 
precipitated the struggle. The main terms of the 
treaty of Bucharest had been fulfilled; the Servians, 
however reluctantly, had been abandoned to them¬ 
selves; and insurgent Greece could for a long time 


396 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


find no hearing in the cabinets of legitimate sove¬ 
reignty. 

But for more than a century, it had been the 
deliberate aim of Russia, to command the Euxine, 
to have an absolutely free communication with the 
Mediteiranean, and to wrest from the Turkish sceptre 
its provinces beyond the Danube. 

Alexander, in his day, steadily pursued it, when¬ 
ever his relations with Trance permitted; and during 
his war with Turkey, repeatedly refused to make 
peace, except it were purchased with the cession of 
the Principalities. It was under the auspices of 
Nicholas that the Ottoman territory was actually 
invaded, after nine years of preparation. 

The events attending the short struggle, proved 
alike the desire and the inability of some of the leading 
European powers to interfere. England was never so 
much at a loss for instruments to check Russian 
aggrandizement. Prussia, which had used its infiu- 
ence against Joseph II. with so much success, was 
now in close alliance with the Russian emperor; and 
Sweden, which, under the bold and inflexible Gus- 
tavus, had almost planted its standards on St. Peters¬ 
burg, has, since the loss of Einland, been effectually 
separated, by a sea, from the powerful empire which it 
at one time rivalled and attempted to subdue. 

It is one of the peculiar advantages of the Russian 
position, that with the largest territory, it has a frontier 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 397 

nowhere peculiarly open to invasion. In Warsaw, the 
centre of Europe, the Russian armies are stationed as 
an advanced guard. On the north, it has, with respect 
to Sweden, every advantage of an ultra-marine posi¬ 
tion. Prussia, from the facility with which its provinces 
might be invaded from Poland, will never seek a dispute 
with its overshadowing neighbor. There remains, 
therefore, Austria only, with whom England could 
concert an opposition toRussian success in Turkey. 
But for purposes of foreign aggression, Austria is pecu¬ 
liarly weak, and, most of all, is weak on the side 
of Russia. Every page of its history shows how 
hard it was obliged to contend for Himgary; how 
earnestly it has desired to secure the adjoining pro¬ 
vinces on either side of the Danube; and the history 
which has occasion to record its longing and repeated 
efforts to acquire the latter provinces, has also to add 
its disappointment and defeat. 

There was therefore no help for Turkey, but 
in its own resources, and the personal character of its 
sovereign. The world has, during the summer of 
1829, had occasion to see what they could accomplish. 
It seemed doubtful, whether it was easier to win from 
him provinces in Asia or in Europe. 

Having thus sought for the origin of the late war 
in the hereditary policy of the Russian government, 
and having explained its rapid issue, from a consider¬ 
ation, first of the difficulties which checked foreign in- 


398 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


fluence, then of the weakness of the Turkish power in 
consequence of domestic factions, and lastly, of the 
personal debihty of the reigning sultan; it only re¬ 
mains to -enumerate the terms on which peace was 
finally conceded. The conclusion of the contest 
has been aptly compared to the termination of the 
second Carthaginian war with Rome. The cases have 
many points of analogy. The Russian general, hke the 
Roman commander, was still a young man; the peace 
in each case was concluded, just as the capital of the 
conquered country was on the point of being attacked. 
The provinces beyond the Danube are lost to the 
Porte, as much as Spain was to the Carthaginians. 
Greece is to Tmkey, what Numidia was to Carthage. 
But if Diebitsch shall be Scipio, where is our Han¬ 
nibal? On the whole, the Roman conqueror pre¬ 
scribed less degrading terms, and acknowledged less 
equivocally the independence of Carthage. 

The commerce of the Turkish empire is surren¬ 
dered to the Russians. They may go to aU ports, and 
conduct their traffic almost on their own terms, inde¬ 
pendent of any plenary exercise of Turkish sovereignty. 
Every Russian who treads on the Turkish soil is pos¬ 
sessed of immunities which the law of nations has 
heretofore hardly conceded to ambassadors. The 
Turk who may murder a Russian cannot avert from 
the Porte a war of annihilation. The Roman tribunes 
were, in their persons, hardly held as sacred, or pro- 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 


399 


tected by as severe threats, as is every Russian subject 
who may henceforth pass the Danube. The Russian 
government retains the privilege of watching over 
every one of its citizens, even after they have entered a 
foreign territory; and it thus acquires a conditional 
right of inquest into every nook and hamlet, every city 
and harbor, every bazaar and encampment of the 
Turks. The precincts of the seraglio, and the re¬ 
cesses of the mosques, nay, for aught we see, the 
presence-chamber of the Sultan, and even the sanctuary 
of Mecca itself, are no longer sacred, except by courtesy. 

These points, rendering Russians, and Russian 
commerce in Turkey, amenable only to Russian au¬ 
thorities, are inconsistent with independence. But 
this is not all. By the peace of Adrianople, the Porte 
is deprived, effectually, though indirectly, of the 
sovereignty of at least eight parts in nineteen of aU 
its European possessions. The Peloponnesus mth 
large additions, Servia, and the Principahties of Mol¬ 
davia and Wallachia, are severed, we trust for ever, 
from the Ottoman sway. 

Whatever relation Greece may bear to the Porte 
and to the rest of Europe, it will stand virtually under 
the guardianship of Russia, and, for the present, will 
have ^vith it a community of interests, as of rehgion 
and of enemies. Statesmen have not forgotten that 
the sovereignty of the Ionian Isles was transferred to 
Great Britain through the hands of Russia; the re- 


400 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


maining isles and the main land still offer every facility 
for contesting, with English ambition, the commerce 
of the Levant, and the supremacy in the ^gean 
sea. Some protection from abroad is essential to the 
new state. Bene viooit, qui bene latuit. Greece will 
probably be to Russia what Elorence was to Austria. 

To Servia, the peace of Adrianople brings hardly 
fewer advantages than to Greece. That country, in 
extent about as large as Denmark, or as Vermont and 
New Hampshire, has been long swept by the besom of 
war, and will probably have to encounter one struggle 
more, previous to its entire emancipation. On com¬ 
paring the conditions of the several treaties of Bucha¬ 
rest, Ackermann, and Adrianople, we find that the 
Porte retains the citadels of Servia (of which Belgrade 
is the chief), and is to receive from the Servians a 
moderate tribute. The Russians guaranty, that it shall 
not be excessive. The more vague the expression, 
the more room is allowed for the interference of the 
stronger party. To the Servians are further conceded 
privileges equal to those enjoyed by the most favored 
provinces, and a right of negotiating under Russian 
auspices, to secure to themselves the liberty of worship, 
the choice of their own chiefs, freedom of commerce with 
all parts of the Turkish territory, the entire domestic 
administration, even over property belonging to Mus¬ 
sulmans, and a prohibition to Mussulmans, other than 
those appertaining to the garrisons, to estabhsh them- 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 401 


selves in Servia. Has not Servia, then, ceased to be 
a Turkish province? Is the sovereignty of the Sultan 
any thing more than nominal? Or, rather, where 
does, in truth, the ultimate sovereignty reside? The 
Porte holds the fortresses ; Russia guaranties the liber¬ 
ties of Servia; the Porte levies a tribute of money; 
Russia has on the affections of the people a hold, which 
can open their most secret coffers; the Porte is ever 
ready to prove its power by oppression; and Russia 
confirms to each Christian inhabitant of Servia, the 
peaceful enjoyment of his property and its rights. 

Respecting the noble provinces of Wallachia and 
Moldavia, jointly equal in extent to about three fourths 
of Florida, Russia, delaying for the present to claim 
them in fee simple, has entered into actual possession, 
under a mortgage which will probably never be dis¬ 
charged. Henceforward Austria has every thing to 
fear and nothing to hope from a war with her neigh¬ 
bor, who now controls the great highway of Hungarian 
commerce, and has easy access to almost one half of 
her frontier. The schemes of Peter the Great are 
accomplished. He found an empire which had no 
communication mth the great seas of commerce but 
through Archangel. His successor is master of the 
Baltic, the Caspian, and the Euxine; and is preparing 
to struggle with the English for the ascendency in the 
iEgean. 

The results of the late war have excited apprehension 
20 


402 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


in England; but not because the British empire in India 
has been endangered by it. The alarm about India 
is a mere chimera; and ages must roll away, and one 
career of wild ambition be succeeded by another, 
before a Russian Genghis would venture to stray into 
India with countless hosts of vagrant conquerors. No ! 
The points of colhsion are much nearer, less magnifi¬ 
cent in extent, but yet immediate and important. 
The command of the Archipelago may be disputed 
between those who protect the Ionian Isles and the 
fosterer of independent Greece. England and Russia, 
the great European rivals, are, indeed, themselves at 
the extremes of the continent; but the states which 
are their respective clients, are situated almost side by 
side, and a predominant influence in the Ionian Isles is 
more than counterbalanced by the cluster of Greek 
islands in the ^gean, and the deep harbors and noble 
bays of continental Greece. 

On the whole, the peace of Adrianople is favorable 
to the best interests of civilization. Some portions 
of regions, on which nature in her kindest mood 
has lavished all the elements of prosperity, are now 
permitted in security to profit by their natural advan¬ 
tages. Servia gains a respite from oppression; the 
means of eventually securing her independence; and 
an opportunity of developing her vast, and, as yet, 
almost wholly unexplored resources. The principalities 
may now prosper, and the desolate majesty of those 


THE WARS OF RUSSIA AND TURKEY. 403 


rich but wasted countries yield to the gentle influ¬ 
ences of accumulated wealth and protected industry. 
But above all, Greece is restored to the affections 
of humanity. Favored by Providence in its situation 
and climate beyond any portion of Europe, its pros¬ 
perity must be rapid and cheering. If local influ¬ 
ences, the temperature and soil of a country, decide on 
the occupations, and in some measure on the character 
of its inhabitants, the virtues and genius of antiquity 
will under some aspect reappear. However much the 
forms of empires may have changed, the great features 
of nature remain unimpaired. The same bright sun, 
which shone on Plato and Phidias, on the heroes of 
Salamis and the orators of the Athenian democracy, 
still rolls with undiminished splendor through the clear 
sky of Hellas. The streams of the Ilyssus and the 
Eurotas flow in their wonted channels. The ohve of 
Minerva still ripens its fruits, and ripens them once 
more for peaceful citizens, who, in their turn, have 
struggled against the barbarian for their domestic 
liberties. It is, indeed, Greece, and living Greece. 
She reappears to take her place in the family of na¬ 
tions. Her star ascends brightly through a sky that 
no longer lowers. 

The remainder of European Turkey lies at the 
mercy of its great adversary. If it had strength to 
commence the recent stniggle, it has, in the present 
treaty of Adrianople, resigned every hope of future 


404 


STUDIES IN HISTORY. 


successful resistance. Indeed, the whole empire of 
Turkey is as prostrate before the Czar, as Persia has 
been since the termination of its late war with Russia. 
The influence of Nicholas prevails from the frozen 
sources of the Tomeo to the Persian Gulf. His ships 
ride triumphantly in aU the Turkish waters ; the lives 
of his subjects are charmed against every aggression 
and violence throughout the Ottoman dominion. He 
has won every thing which was essential to the pros¬ 
perity of the provinces which acknowledge his sway. 
He has done something for the cause of humanity. 
But now the world has a yet deeper interest in the 
wise administration of the internal concerns of Russia, 
and in the personal character of her sovereign. Since 
it would be idle to wish for her many provinces that 
highest good which comes from the conflict of free 
opinions, we will hope that he may emulate the mild 
virtues of an Antonine, rather than the less arduous 
and less rare distinction of extensive conquest. 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


A WORD ON CALVIN, THE REFORMER. 

Northampton, Oct. 22, 1834. 

It is intolerance only, which would limit the praise 
of Calvin to a single sect, or refuse to reverence his vir¬ 
tues and regret his failings. He hved in the time 
when nations were shaken to their centre by the ex¬ 
citement of the reformation; when the fields of Holland 
and France were wet with the carnage of persecution; 
when vindictive monarchs on the one side threatened 
all protestants with outlawry and death, and the Vatican 
on the other sent forth its anathemas and its cry for 
blood. In that day, it is too true, the infiuence of an 
ancient, long estabhshed, hardly disputed error, the 
constant danger of his position, the intense desire to 
secure union among the antagonists of popery, the 
engrossing consciousness that his struggle was for the 
emancipation of the Clmstian world, induced the great 
reformer to defend the use of the sword for the extirpa¬ 
tion of heresy. Reprobating and lamenting his adhe¬ 
sion to the cruel doctrine, which aU Christendom had 


406 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


for centuries implicitly received, we may, as repub¬ 
licans, remember that Calvin was not only the founder 
of a sect, but foremost among the most efficient of 
modern republican legislators. More truly benevolent 
to the human race than Solon, more self-denying than 
Lycurgus, the genius of Calvin infused enduring ele¬ 
ments into the institutions of Geneva, and made it for 
the modern world, the impregnable fortress of popular 
liberty, the fertile seed-plot of democracy. 

We boast of our common schools; Calvin was the 
father of popular education, the inventor of the system 
of free schools. We are proud of the free States that 
fringe the Atlantic. The pilgrims of Plymouth were 
Calvinists; the best influence in South Carohna came 
from the Calvinists of Prance. William Penn was the 
disciple of the Huguenots; the ships from Holland 
that first brought colonists to Manhattan were filled 
with Calvinists. He that will not honor the memory, 
and respect the influence of Calvin, knows but little 
of the origin of American liberty. 

If personal considerations chiefly win applause, 
then no one merits our sympathy and our admiration 
more than Calvin; the young exile from Prance, who 
achieved an immortality of fame before he was twenty- 
eight years of age; now boldly reasoning with the king 
of Prance for religious liberty; now venturing as the 
apostle of truth to carry the new doctrines into the heart 
of Italy, and hardly escaping from the fury of papal 


CALVIN, THE REFORMER. 


407 


persecution; the purest writer, the keenest dialectician 
of his century ; pushing free inquiry to its utmost verge, 
and yet valuing inquiry solely as the means of aniving 
at fixed conclusions. The light of his genius scattered 
the mask of darkness which superstition had held for 
centuries before the brow of religion. His probity was 
unquestioned, his morals spotless. His only happiness 
consisted in his ‘‘ task of glory and of goodfor sor¬ 
row found its way into all his private relations. He 
was an exile from his country ; he became for a season 
an exile from his place of exile. As a husband he was 
doomed to mourn the premature loss of his wife; as a 
father, he felt the bitter pang of biu-ying his only child. 
Alone in the world, alone in a strange land, he went 
forward in his career with serene resignation and in¬ 
dexible firmness; no love of ease tmmed him aside 
from his vigils; no fear of danger relaxed the nerve of 
his eloquence; no bodily infirmities checked the in¬ 
credible activity of his mind; and so he continued, 
year after year, sohtary and feeble, yet toiling for 
humanity, till after a life of glory, he bequeathed 
to his personal hens, a fortune, in books and furniture, 
stocks and money, not exceeding two himdred dollars, 
and to the world a purer reformation, a republican 
spirit in religion, with the kindred principles of repub¬ 
lican liberty. 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE IN ART, GOVERN¬ 
MENT, AND RELIGION. 


AJ? OPvATION DELIVEKED BEFOEE THE ADELPHI SOCIETY OF WIL- 
LIAMSTOWN COLLEGE, IN AUGUST, 1885. 


I. 

The material world does not change in its masses 
or in its powers. The stars shme with no more lustre 
than when they first sang together in the glory of their 
birth. The flowers that gemmed the fields and the 
forests, before America was discovered, now bloom 
around us in their season. The sun that shone on 
Homer shines on us in unchanging lustre. The bow 
that beamed on the patriarch still glitters in the 
clouds. Nature is the same. Tor her no new forces 
are generated; no new capacities are discovered. The 
earth turns on its axis, and perfects its revolutions, and 
renews its seasons, without increase or advancement. 

But a like passive destiny does not attach to 
the inhabitants of the earth. Tor them the expecta¬ 
tions of social improvement are no delusion; the hopes 
of philanthropy are more than a dream. The five 



THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


409 


senses do not constitute the whole inventory of our 
sources of knowledge. They are the organs by 
which thought connects itself with the external uni¬ 
verse; but the power of thought is not merged in 
the exercise of its instruments. We have functions 
which connect us with heaven, as well as organs 
which set us in relation with earth. We have not 
merely the senses opening to us the external world, 
but an internal sense, which places us in connexion 
with the world of intelligence and the decrees of God. 

There is a spirit in man: not in the privileged 
few; not in those of us only who by the favor of 
Providence have been nursed in public schools: it is 
IN MAN : it is the attribute of the race. The spirit, 
which is the guide to truth, is the gracious gift to each 
member of the human family. 

Reason exists within every breast. I mean not 
that faculty which deduces inferences from the expe¬ 
rience of the senses, but that higher faculty, which 
from the infinite treasures of its own consciousness, 
originates truth, and assents to it by the force of 
intuitive evidence; that faculty which raises us beyond 
the control of time and space, and gives us faith in 
things eternal and invisible. There is not the difference 
between one mind and another, which the pride of 
philosophers might conceive. To them no faculty is 
conceded, which does not belong to the meanest of 
their countrymen. In them there can not spring up a 


410 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


truth, which does not equally have its germ in every 
mind. They have not the power of creation; they can 
but reveal what God has implanted in every breast. 

The intellectual functions, by which relations are 
perceived, are the common endowments of the race. 
The differences are apparent, not real. The eye in one 
person may be duU, in another quiek, in one distorted, 
and in another tranquil and clear; yet the relation of 
the eye to light is in all men the same. Just so 
judgment may be liable in individual minds to the 
bias of passion, and yet its relation to truth is immu¬ 
table, and is universal. 

In questions of practieal duty, conscience is God's 
umpire, whose light illumines every heart. There is 
nothing in books, which had not first, and has not stHl 
its life within us. Religion itself is a dead letter, 
wherever its truths are not renewed in the soul. 
Individual conscience may be corrupted by interest, 
or debauched by pride, yet the rule of morality is 
distinetly marked; its harmonies are to the mind like 
music to the ear; and the moral judgment, when care¬ 
fully analyzed and referred to its principles, is always 
founded in right. The eastern superstition, which bids 
its victims prostrate themselves before the advancing 
car of their idols, springs from a noble root, and is but 
a melancholy perversion of that self-devotion, which 
enables the Christian to bear the cross, and subject his 
personal passions to the will of God. Immorality of 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


411 


itself never won to its support the inward voice; con¬ 
science, if questioned, never forgets to curse the guilty 
mth the memory of sin, to cheer the upright with the 
meek tranquillity of approval. And this admirable 
power, which is the instinct of Deity, is the attribute 
of every man; it knocks at the palace gate, it dwells in 
the meanest hovel. Duty, hke death, enters every 
abode, and dehvers its message. Conscience, like 
reason and judgment, is universal. 

That the moral affections are planted every where, 
needs only to be asserted to be received. The savage 
mother loves her offspring with all the fondness that a 
mother can know. Beneath the odorous shade of the 
boundless forests of Chili, the native youth repeats the 
story of love as sincerely as it was ever chanted in the 
valley of Vaucluse. The affections of family are not 
the growth of civilization. The charities of life are 
scattered every where; enamelling the vales of human 
being, as the flowers paint the meadows. They are 
not the fruit of study, nor the privilege of refinement, 
but a natm’al instinct. 

Our age has seen a revolution in works of ima¬ 
gination. The poet has sought his theme in common 
life. Never is the genius of Scott more pathetic, than 
when, as in the Antiquary, he delmeates the sorrows 
of a poor fisherman, or as in the Heart of Mid Lothian, 
he takes his heroine from a cottage. And even Words¬ 
worth, the purest and most original poet of the day, in 


412 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


spite of the inveterate character of his political predi¬ 
lections, has thrown the light of genius on the walks of 
commonest life; he finds a lesson in every grave of the 
village churchyard; he discloses the boundless treasures 
of feehng in the peasant, the laborer and the artisan; 
the strolhng peddler becomes, through his genius, a 
teacher of the subhmest morahty; and the solitary 
wagoner, the lonely shepherd, even the feeble mother 
of an idiot boy, furnishes lessons in the reverence for 
Humanity. 

If from things relating to truth, justice, and 
affection, we turn to those relating to the beautiful, we 
may here still further assert, that the sentiment for the 
beautiful resides in every breast. The lovely forms of 
the external world delight us from their adaptation to 
our powers. 

Yea, what were mighty Nature’s self ? 

Her features could they win us. 

Unhelped by the poetic voice 
That hourly speaks within us ? 

The Indian mother, on the borders of Hudson’s 
Bay, decorates her manufactures with ingenious de¬ 
vices and lovely colors, prompted by the same instinct 
which guided the pencil and mixed the colors of 
Raphael. The inhabitant of Nootka Sound tattoos 
his body with the method of harmonious Arabesques. 
Every form, to which the hands of the artist have ever 
given birth, sprung first into being as a conception 



THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


413 


of his mind, from a natural faculty, which belongs not 
to the artist exclusively, but to man. Beauty, hke 
truth and justice, hves within us; hke virtue and like 
moral law, it is a companion of the soul. The power 
which leads to the production of beautiful forms, or to 
the perception of them in the works which God has 
made, is an attribute of Humanity. 

But I am asked if I despise learning ? Shall one 
who has spent much of his life in schools and univer¬ 
sities plead the equality of uneducated nature? Is 
there no difference between the man of refinement and 
the savage P 

“I am a man,” said Black Hawk nobly to the 
chief of the first republic in the world; “I am a man,” 
said the barbarous chieftain, ** and you are another.” 

I speak for the universal diffusion of human 
powers, not of human attainments; for the capacity 
for progress, not for the perfection of undisciphned 
instincts. The fellowship which we should cherish with 
the race, receives the Comanche warrior and the 
Caffre within the pale of equality. Their functions 
may not have been exercised, but they exist. Immure 
a person in a dungeon; as he comes to the light of 
day, his vision seems incapable of performing its office. 
Does that destroy your conviction in the relation be¬ 
tween the eye and light? The rioter over his cups 
resolves to eat and drink and be merry; he forgets his 
spiritual nature in his obedience to the senses; but 


414 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


does that destroy the relation between conscience and 
eternity? ‘‘What ransom shall we give? ’’ exclaimed 
the senators of Rome to the savage Attila. “ Give/’ 
said the barbarian, “all your gold and jewels, your 
costly furniture and treasures, and set free every 
slave.” “ Ah,” replied the degenerate Romans, 
“ what then will be left to us ? ” “I leave you 
your souls,” rephed the unlettered invader from the 
steppes of Asia, who had learnt in the wilderness 
to value the immortal mind, and to despise the servile 
herd, that esteemed only their fortunes, and had no 
true respect for themselves. You cannot discover a 
tribe of men, but you also find the charities of life, and 
the proofs of spiritual existence. Behold the ignorant 
Algonquin deposit a bow and quiver by the side of the 
departed warrior; and recognise his faith in immor¬ 
tality. See the Comanche chieftain, in the heart of om’ 
continent, inflict on himself severest penance; and 
reverence his confession of the needed atonement for 
sin. The Barbarian who roams our western prairies 
has like passions and like endowments with ourselves. 
He bears within him the instinct of Deity; the con¬ 
sciousness of a spiritual nature; the love of beauty; 
the rule of morality. 

And shall we reverence the dark-skinned Caffre ? 
Shall we respect the brutal Hottentot? You may read 
the right answer written on every heart. It bids me 
not despise the sable hunter, that gathers a livelihood 



THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


415 


in the forests of Southern Africa. All are men. 
When we know the Hottentot better, we shall despise 
him less. 


II. 

If it be true, that the gifts of mind and heart are 
universally diffused, if the sentiment of truth, justice, 
love, and beauty exists in every one, then it follows, as 
a necessary consequence, that the common judgment in 
taste, politics, and religion, is the highest authority on 
earth, and the nearest possible approach to an infallible 
decision. Prom the consideration of individual powers 
I turn to the action of the human mind in masses. 

If reason is a universal faculty, the universal de¬ 
cision is the nearest criterion of truth. The common 
mind winnows opinions; it is the sieve which separates 
error from certainty. The exercise by many of the same 
faculty on the same subject would naturally lead to 
the same conclusions. But if not, the veiy differences 
of opinion that arise prove the supreme judgment 
of the general mind. Truth is one. It never con¬ 
tradicts itself. One truth cannot contradict another 
truth. Hence truth is a bond of union. But 
error not only contradicts truth, but may contra¬ 
dict itself; so that there may be many errors, and 
each at variance with the rest. Truth is therefore 
of necessity an element of harmony; error as neces¬ 
sarily an element of discord. Thus there can be 


416 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


no continuing universal judgment but a right one. 
Men cannot agree in an absurdity; neither can they 
agree in a falsehood. 

If wrong opinions have often been cherished by 
the masses, the cause always lies in the complexity of 
the ideas presented. Error finds its way into the soul 
of a nation, only through the channel of truth. It 
is to a truth that men listen; and if they accept er¬ 
ror also, it is only because the error is for the time 
so closely interwoven with the truth, that the one 
cannot readily be separated from the other. 

Unmixed error can have no existence in the public 
mind. Wherever you see men clustering together to 
form a party, you may be sm^e that however much 
error may be there, truth is there also. Apply this 
principle boldly; for it contains a lesson of candor, 
and a voice of encouragement. There never was 
a school of philosophy, nor a clan in the realm of 
opinion, but carried along with it some important 
truth. And therefore every sect that has ever flour¬ 
ished has benefited Humanity; for the errors of a 
sect pass away and are forgotten; its truths are re¬ 
ceived into the common inheritance. To know the 
seminal thought of every prophet and leader of a 
sect, is to gather aU the wisdom of mankind. 

‘‘ By heaven! there should not be a seer, who left 
The world one doctrine, but I’d task his lore. 

And commune with his spirit. All the truth 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


417 


Of all the tongues of earth, Td have them all, 

Had I the powerful spell to raise their ghosts.’’ 

The sentiment of beauty, as it exists in the human 
mind, is the criterion in works of art, inspires the con¬ 
ceptions of genius, and exercises a final judgment on 
its productions. For who are the best judges in mat¬ 
ters of taste ? Do you think the cultivated individual ? 
Undoubtedly not; but the collective mind. The pub¬ 
lic is wiser than the wisest critic. In Athens, the arts 
were carried to perfection, when “the fierce demo- 
cracie ” was in the ascendant; the temple of Minerva 
and the works of Phidias were planned and perfected to 
please the common people. When Greece yielded to 
tyrants, her genius for excellence in art expired; or 
rather, the purity of taste disappeared; because the 
artist then endeavored to gratify a patron, and there¬ 
fore, humored his caprice; while before he had en¬ 
deavored to delight the race. 

When, after a long eclipse, the arts again burst into 
a splendid existence, it was equally under a popular 
influence. During the rough contests and feudal 
tyrannies of the middle age, rehgion had opened in 
the church an asylum for the people. There the serf 
and the beggar could kneel; there the pilgrim and the 
laborer were shrived; and the children of misfortune 
not less than the prosperous were welcomed to the 
house of prayer. The church was, consequently, at 
once the guardian of equality, and the nurse of the 
27 


418 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


arts; and the souls of Giotto, and Perugino, and 
Raphael, moved by an infinite sympathy with the 
crowd, kindled into divine conceptions of beautiful 
fonns. Appealing to the sentiment of devotion in the 
common mind, they dipped their pencils in living 
colors, to decorate the altars where man adored. By 
degrees the wealthy nobility desired in hke manner to 
adorn their palaces; but at the attempt, the quick 
familiarity of the artist with the beautiful declined. 
Instead of the brilliant works which spoke to the 
soul, a school arose, who* appealed to the senses; 
and in the land which had produced the most moving 
pictures, addressed to the religious feeling, and instinct 
with the purest beauty, the banquet halls were covered 
with grotesque forms, such as float before the imagina¬ 
tion, when excited and bewildered by sensual indul¬ 
gence. Instead of holy families, the ideal repre¬ 
sentations of the virgin mother and the godlike child, 
of the enduring faith of martyrs, of the blessed 
benevolence of evangelic love, there came the motley 
group of fawns and satps, of Diana stooping to Endy- 
mion, of voluptuous beauty, and the forms of licentious¬ 
ness. Humanity frowned on the desecration of the 
arts; and painting, no longer vivified by a fellow- 
feeling with the multitude, lost its greatness in the 
attempt to adapt itself to personal humors. 

If with us the arts are destined to a brilliant 
career, the inspiration must spring from the vigor of 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


419 


the people. Genius will not create, to flatter patrons 
or decorate saloons. It yearns for larger influences; 
it feeds on wider sympathies; and its perfect display 
can never exist, except in an appeal to the general sen¬ 
timent for the beautiful. 

Again. Italy is famed for its musical compositions, 
its inimitable operas. It is a well-known fact, that the 
best critics are often deceived in their judgment of 
them; while the pit, composed of the throng, does, 
without fail, render a true verdict. 

But the taste for music, it may be said, is favored 
by natural organization. Precisely a statement that 
sets in a clearer light the natural capacity of the race ; 
for taste is then not an acquisition, but in part a gift. 
But let us pass to works of literature. 

Who are by way of eminence the poets of all man¬ 
kind? Surely Homer and Shakspeare. Now Homer 
formed his taste, as he wandered from door to door, a 
vagrant minstrel, paying for hospitality by a song; and 
Shakspeare wrote for an audience, composed in a great 
measure of the common people. , 

The little story of Paid and Virginia is a universal 
favorite. When it w^as first written, the author read it 
aloud to a circle in Paris, composed of the wife of the 
prime minister, and the choicest critics of Prance. 
They condemned it, as dull and insipid. The author 
appealed to the public; and the children of all Europe 
reversed the decree of the Parisians. The judgment 


420 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


of children, that is, the judgment of the common mind 
under its most innocent and least imposing form, was 
more trustworthy than the criticism of the select 
refinement of the most polished city in the world. 

Demosthenes of old formed himself to the perfection 
of eloquence by means of addresses to the crowd. The 
great comic poet of Greece, emphatically the poet of the 
vulgar mob, is distinguished above all others for the 
incomparable graces of his diction; and it is related of 
one of the most skilful writers in the Italian, that 
when inquired of where he had learned the purity and 
nationality of his style, he replied, from listening to 
the country people, as they brought their produce 
to market. 

At the revival of letters a distinguishing feature of 
the rising literature was the employment of the dialect 
of the vulgar. Dante used the language of the popu¬ 
lace and won immortality; Wickliffe, Luther, and at a 
later day Descartes, each employed his mother tongue, 
and carried truth directly to all who were familiar 
with its accents. Every beneficent revolution in letters 
has the character of popularity; every great reform 
among authors has sprung from the power of the 
people in its influence on the development and activity 
of mind. 

The same infiuence continues unimpaired. Scott, in 
spite of his reverence for the aristocracy, spurned a draw¬ 
ing-room reputation; the secret of Byron’s superiority 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


421 


lay in part in the agreement which existed between his 
muse and the democratic tendency of the age. Ger¬ 
man literature is almost entirely a popular creation. 
It was fostered by no monarch; it was dandled by no 
aristocracy. It was plebeian in its origin, and therefore 
manly in its results. 


III. 

In like manner the best government rests on the 
people and not on the few, on persons and not on 
property, on the free development of public opinion and 
not on authority; because the munificent Author of our 
being has conferred the gifts of mind upon every mem¬ 
ber of the human race without distinction of outward 
circumstances. Whatever of other possessions may be 
engrossed, mind asserts its own independence. Lands, 
estates, the produce of mines, the prolific abundance of 
the seas, may be usurped by a privileged class. 
Avarice, assuming the form of ambitious power, may 
grasp realm after realm, subdue continents, compass 
the earth in its schemes of aggrandizement, and sigh 
after other worlds; but mind eludes the power of ap¬ 
propriation ; it exists only in its own individuality; it 
is a property which cannot be confiscated and cannot 
be tom away; it laughs at chains; it bursts from im¬ 
prisonment; it defies monopoly. A government of 
equal rights must, therefore, rest upon mind; not 
wealth, not bmte force, the sum of the moral intel- 


422 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


ligence of the community should rule the State. Pre¬ 
scription can no more assume to be a valid plea for 
political injustice; society studies to eradicate estab¬ 
lished abuses, and to bring social institutions and 
laws into harmony with moral right; not dismayed by 
the natural and necessary imperfections of aU human 
effort, and not giving way to despair, because every 
hope does not at once ripen into fruit. 

The public happiness is the true object of legis¬ 
lation, and can be secm^ed only by the masses of 
mankind themselves awakening to the knowledge and 
the care of their own interests. Our free institutions 
have reversed the false and ignoble distinctions between 
men; and refusing to gratify the pride of caste, have 
acknowledged the common mind to be the true mate¬ 
rial for a commonwealth. Every thing has hitherto 
been done for the happy few. It is not possible to 
endow an aristocracy with greater benefits than they 
have already enjoyed; there is no room to hope that 
individuals will be more higlily gifted or more fully 
developed than the greatest sages of past times. The 
world can advance only through the culture of the 
moral and intellectual powers of the people To 
accomplish this end by means of the people themselves, 
is the highest purpose of government. If it be the 
duty of the individual to strive after a perfection like 
the perfection of God, how much more ought a nation 
to be the image of Deity. (The common mind is the 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


423 


true Parian marble, fit to be wrought into likeness to a 
God. j The duty of America is to secure the culture 
and the happiness of the masses by their rehance on 
themselves. 

The absence of the prejudices of the old world 
leaves us here the opportimity of consulting inde¬ 
pendent truth; and man is left to apply the instinct of 
freedom to every social relation and public interest. 
We have approached so near to nature, that we can 
hear her gentlest whispers; we have made Humanity 
our lawgiver and our oracle; and, therefore, the nation 
receives, vivifies and apphes principles, which in Europe 
the wisest accept with distrust. Freedom of mind and 
of conscience, freedom of the seas, freedom of industry, 
equality of franchises, each great truth is firmly grasped, 
comprehended and enforced; for the multitude i^^ 
neither rash nor fickle. In truth, it is less fickle than 
those who profess to be its guides. Its natural dia-^ 
lectics surpass the logic of the schools. Political action 
has never been so consistent and so unwavering, as 
when it results from a feeling or a principle, diffused 
through society. The people is firm and tranquil in 
its movements, and necessarily acts with moderation, 
because it becomes but slowly impregnated with new 
ideas; and efiects no changes, except in harmony with 
the knowledge which it has acquired. Besides, where 
it is permanently possessed of power, there exists 
neither the occasion nor the desire for frequent change. 


424 OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 

It is not the parent of tumult; sedition is bred in the 
lap of luxury, and its chosen emissaries are the beg¬ 
gared spendthrift and the impoverished libertine. The 
government by the people is in very truth the strong¬ 
est government in the world. Discarding the imple¬ 
ments of terror, it dares to rule by moral force, and 
has its citadel in the heart. 

Such is the political system which rests on reason, 
reflection, and the free expression of deliberate choice. 
There may be those who scoff at the suggestion, that 
the decision of the whole is to be preferred to the judg¬ 
ment of the enlightened few. They say in their hearts 
that the masses are ignorant; that farmers know 
nothing of legislation; that mechanics should not quit 
their workshops to join in forming public opinion. But 
true political science does indeed venerate the masses. 
It maintains, not as has been perversely asserted, that 
the people can make right,’’ but that the people can 
DISCERN right. Individuals are but shadows, too often 
engrossed by the pursuit of shadows; the race is im¬ 
mortal : individuals are of hmited sagacity; the com¬ 
mon mind is infinite in its experience : individuals are 
languid and blind; the many are ever wakeful: indi¬ 
viduals are corrupt; the race has been redeemed: 
individuals are time-serving; the masses are fearless: 
individuals may be false, the masses are ingenuous and 
sincere: individuals claim the divine sanction of truth 
for the deceitful conceptions of their own fancies; the 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


425 


Spirit of God breathes through the combined intelli¬ 
gence of the people. Truth is not to be ascertained by 
the impulses of an individual; it emerges from the 
contradictions of personal opinions; it raises itself in 
majestic serenity above the strifes of parties and the 
conflict of sects; it acknowledges neither the solitary 
mind, nor the separate faction as its oracle; but o^vns 
as its only faithful interpreter the dictates of pure 
reason itself, proclaimed by the general voice of man¬ 
kind. The decrees of the universal conscience are the 
nearest approach to the presence of God in the soul 
of man. 

Thus the opinion which we respect is, indeed, 
not the opinion of one or of a few, but the sa¬ 
gacity of the many. It is hard for the pride of culti¬ 
vated philosophy to put its ear to the ground, and 
listen reverently to the voice of lowly humanity ; yet the 
people collectively are wiser than th^ most gifted indi¬ 
vidual, for all his wisdom constitutes but a part of 
theirs. When the great sculptor of Greece was en¬ 
deavoring to fashion the perfect model of beauty, he 
did not passively imitate the form of the lovehest 
woman of his age; but he gleaned the several linea¬ 
ments of his faultless work from the many. And so it 
is, that a perfect judgment is the result of comparison, 
when error eliminates error, and truth is established by 
concurring witnesses. The organ of truth is the in¬ 
visible decision of the unbiased world; she pleads 


426 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


before no tribunal but public opinion; she owns no 
safe interpreter but the common mind; she knows no 
court of appeals but the soul of humanity. It is y 
when the multitude give counsel, that right purposes ^ 
find safety; thehs is the fixedness that cannot be < 
shaken; theirs is the understanding which exceeds in 
wisdom; theirs is the heart, of which the largeness is 
as the sand on the sea-shore. 

It is not by vast armies, by immense natural re¬ 
sources, by accumulations of treasure, that the greatest 
results in modern civilization have been accomplished. 
The traces of the career of conquest pass away, hardly 
leaving a scar on the national intelligence. The famous 
battle grounds of victory are, most of them, comparative¬ 
ly indifferent to the human race; barren fields of blood, 
the scourges of their times, but affecting the social con¬ 
dition as little as the raging of a pestilence. Not one 
benevolent institu»tion, not one amehorating principle 
in the Roman state, was a voluntary concession of the 
aristocracy; each useful element was borrowed from 
the Democracies of Greece, or was a reluctant con¬ 
cession to the demands of the people. The same is 
true in modern political fife. It is the confession of an-^ 
enemy to Democracy, that all the great and noble 

INSTITUTIONS OF THE WORLD HAVE COME FROM POPULAR 
EFFORTS.” 

It is the uniform tendency of the popular element 
to elevate and bless Humanity. The exact measure 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


427 


of the progress of civilization is the degree in which 
the inteUigence of the common mind has prevailed over 
wealth and brute force; in other words, the measure 
of the progress of civilization is the progress of the 
people. Every great object, connected with the be¬ 
nevolent exertions of the day, has reference to the 
culture of those powers which are alone the common 
inheritance. Eor this the envoys of religion cross seas, 
and visit remotest isles; for this the press in its free¬ 
dom teems with the productions of maturest thought; 
for this the philanthropist plans new schemes of educa¬ 
tion ; for this halls in eveiy city and village are open to 
the public instructor. Not that we view with indif¬ 
ference the glorious efforts of material industry; the 
increase in the facility of internal intercourse; the accu¬ 
mulations of thrifty labor; the varied results of concen¬ 
trated action. But even there it is mind that achieves 
the triumph. It is the genius of the architect that 
gives beauty to the work of human hands, and makes 
the temple, the dwelling, or the public edifice, an out¬ 
ward representation of the spirit of propriety and order. 
It is science that guides the bhnd zeal of cupidity to 
the construction of the vast channels of communication, 
which are fast binding the world into one family. 
And it is as a method of moral improvement, that these 
swifter means of intercourse derive their greatest 
value. Mind becomes universal property; the poem 
that is published on the soil of England, finds its 


428 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


response on the shores of lake Erie and the banks of 
the Missouri, and is admired near the sources of the 
Ganges. The defence of public liberty in our own 
haUs of legislation penetrates the plains of Poland, is 
echoed along the mountains of Greece, and pierces the 
darkest night of eastern despotism. 

The universality of the intellectual and moral 
powers, and the necessity of their development for the 
progress of the race, proclaim the great doctrine of the 
natural right of every human being to moral and intel¬ 
lectual culture. It is the glory of our fathers to have 
established in their laws the equal claims of every child 
to the public care of its morals and its mind. Erom 
this principle we may deduce the universal right to 
leisure; that is, to time not appropriated to material 
purposes, but reserved for the culture of the moral 
affections and the mind. It does not tolerate the ex¬ 
clusive enjoyment of leisure by a privileged class; but 
defending the rights of labor, would suffer none to 
sacrifice the higher purposes of existence in unceasing 
toil for that which is not life. Such is the voice of 
nature; such the conscious claim of the human mind. 
The universe opens its pages to every eye; the music 
of creation resounds in every ear; the glorious lessons 
of immortal truth, that are written in the sky and on 
the earth, address themselves to every mind, and claim 
attention from every human being. God has made 
man upright, that he might look before and after; and 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


429 


he calls upon every one not merely to labor, but to 
reflect; not merely to practise the revelations of divine 
will, but to contemplate the displays of divine power. 
Nature claims for every man leisure, for she claims 
every man as a witness to the divine glory, manifested 
in the created world. 

“Yet evermore, through years renewed 
In undisturbed vicissitude 
Of seasons balancing their flight 
On the swift wings of day and night. 

Kind nature keeps a heavenly door 
Wide open for the scattered poor. 

Where flower-breathed incense to the skies 
Is wafted in mute harmonies; 

And ground fresh cloven by the plough 
Is fragrant wdth an humbler vow ; 

Where birds and brooks from leafy dells 
Chime forth unwearied canticles. 

And vapors magnify and spread 
The glory of the sun’s bright head ; 

Still constant in her worship, still 
Conforming to the Almighty Will, 

Whether men sow or reap the fields. 

Her admonitions nature yields; 

That not by bread alone we hve. 

Or what a hand of flesh can give; 

That every day should leave some part 
Tree for a sabbath of the heart; 


I 


430 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


So shall the seventh be truly blest, 

From mom to eve, with hallowed rest.’’ 

The right to universal education being thus ac¬ 
knowledged by our conscience, not less than by our 
laws, it follows, that the people is the true recipient of 
truth. Do not seek to conciliate individuals; do not 
dread the frowns of a sect; do not yield to the pro¬ 
scriptions of a party; but pour out truth into the com¬ 
mon mind. Let the waters of intelligence, like the 
rains of heaven, descend on the whole earth. And 
be not discouraged by the dread of encountering 
ignorance. The prejudices of ignorance are more 
easily removed than the prejudices of interest; the 
first are blindly adopted; the second wilfully preferred. 
Intelligence must be diffused among the whole people; 
truth must be scattered among those who have no 
interest to suppress its growth. The seeds that fall on 
the exchange, or in the hum of business, may be 
choired by the thorns that spring up in the hotbed 
of avarice; the seeds that are let fall in the saloon, 
may be hke those dropped by the wayside, which take 
no root. Let the young aspirant after glory scatter 
the seeds of truth broadcast on the wide bosom of Hu¬ 
manity ; in the deep, fertile soil of the public mind. 
There it will strike deep root and spring up, and bear 
an hundred-fold, and bloom for ages, and ripen fruit 
through remote generations. 

It is alone by infusing great principles into the 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


431 


common mind, that revolutions in human society are 
brought about. They never have been, they never can 
be, effected by superior individual excellence. The age 
of the Antonines is the age of the greatest glory of the 
Roman empire. Men distinguished by every accom¬ 
plishment of culture and science, for a century in suc¬ 
cession, possessed imdisputed sway over more than a 
hundred millions of men; tiU at last, in the person of 
Mark Aurelian, philosophy herself seemed to mount the 
throne. And did she stay the do^vnward tendencies 
of the Roman empire ? Did she infuse new elements 
of life into the decaying constitution ? Did she com¬ 
mence one great, beneficent reform? Not one perma¬ 
nent amehoration was effected; philosophy was clothed 
with absolute power; and yet absolute power accom¬ 
plished nothing for Hmnanity. It could accomplish 
nothing. Had it been possible, Aurehan would have 
wrought a change. Society can be regenerated, the 
human race can be advanced, only by moral prin¬ 
ciples diffused through the multitude. 

And now let us take an opposite instance; let us 
see, if amehoration Mows, when in despite of tyranny 
truth finds access to the common people; and Chris¬ 
tianity itself shah furnish my example. 

When Christianity first made its way into Rome, 
the imperial city was the seat of wealth, philosophy, and 
luxury. Absolute government was already established; 
and had the wih of Claudius been gained, or the con- 


432 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


science of Messalina been roused, or the heart of Nar¬ 
cissus, once a slave, then prime minister, been touched 
by the recollections of his misfortunes, the aid of the 
sovereign of the civilized world would have been 
engaged. And did the messenger of divine truth 
make his appeal to them? Was his mission to the 
emperor and his minions ? to the empress and her 
flatterers ? to servile senators ? to wealthy favorites ? 
Paul preserves for us the names of the first converts; 
the Roman Mary and Junia; Julia and Nerea; and 
the beloved brethren; all plebeian names, unknown to 
history. “ Greet them,” he adds, that be of the 
household of Narcissus.” Now every Roman house¬ 
hold was a community of slaves. Narcissus himself, a 
freedman, was the chief minister of the Roman em¬ 
pire ; his ambition had left him no moments for the 
envoy from Calvary; the friends of Paul were a freed- 
man’s slaves. When God selected the channel by 
which Christianity should make its way in the city of 
Rome, and assuredly be carried forward to acknow¬ 
ledged supremacy in the Roman empire, he gave to the 
Apostle of the Gentiles favor in the household of Nar¬ 
cissus ; he planted truth deep in the common soil. Plad 
Christianity leen received at court, it would have been 
stifled or corrupted by the prodigal vices of the age; it 
lived in the hearts of the common people; it sheltered 
itself against oppression in the catacombs and among 
tombs; it made misfortune its convert, and sorrow its 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


433 


companion, and labor its stay. It rested on a rock, 
for it rested on the people; it was gifted with immor¬ 
tality, for it struck root in the hearts of the million. 

So completely was this greatest of all reforms 
carried forward in the vale of life, that the great moral 
revolution, the great step of God’s Providence in the 
education of the human race, was not observed by the 
Roman historians. Once, indeed, at tliis early period 
Christians are mentioned; for in the reign of Nero, 
their purity being hateful to the corrupt, Nero aban¬ 
doned them to persecution. In the darkness of mid¬ 
night, they were covered with pitch and set on fire to 
light the streets of Rome, and this singularity has been 
recorded. But their system of morals and religion, 
though it was the new birth of the world, escaped 
all notice. 

Paul, who was a Roman citizen, was beheaded, 
just outside of the walls of the eternal city; and Peter, 
who was a plebeian, and could not claim the distinction 
of the axe and the block, was executed on the cross, 
with his head downwards to increase the pain and the 
indignity. Do you think the Roman emperor took 
notice of the names of these men, when he signed their 
death-warrant ? And yet, as they poured truth into 
the common mind, what series of kings, what lines of 
emperors can compare with them, in their influence on 
the destinies of mankind ? 

c Yes, reforms in society are only effected through the 


434 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


masses of the people, and through them have continually 
taken place. New truths have been successively devel¬ 
oped, and, becoming the common property of the human 
family, have improved its condition. This progress is 
advanced by every sect, precisely because each sect, to 
obtain vitality, does of necessity embody a truth; by 
every political party, for the conflicts of party are the 
war of ideas; by every nationality, for a nation cannot 
exist as such, till humanity makes it a special trustee 
of some part of its wealth for the ultimate benefit of 
all. The irresistible tendency of the human race is 
therefore to advancement, for absolute power has never 
succeeded, and can never succeed, in suppressing a 
single truth. An idea once revealed may find its 
admission into every living breast and live there. 
Like God it becomes immortal and omnipresent. The 
movement of the species is upward, irresistibly upward. 
The individual is often lost; Providence never disowns 
the race. No principle once promulgated, has ever 
been forgotten. No ‘‘timely tramp’’ of a despot’s 
foot ever trod out one idea. The world cannot retro¬ 
grade ; the dark ages cannot return. Dynasties perish; 
cities are buried; nations have been victims to 
error, or martyrs for right; Humanity has always been 
on the advance; gaining maturity, universality, and 
power. 

Yes, truth is immortal; it cannot be destroyed; it 
is invincible, it cannot long be resisted. Not every 


THE OFFICE OF THE PEOPLE. 


435 


great principle has yet been generated; but when once 
proclaimed and diffused, it hves without end, in the safe 
custody of the race. States may pass away; every 
just principle of legislation which has been once estab¬ 
lished will endure. Philosophy has sometimes forgot¬ 
ten God; a great people never did. The skepticism 
of the last century could not uproot Christianity, be¬ 
cause it lived in the hearts of the miUions. Do you 
think that infidehty is spreading ? Cliristianity never 
lived in the hearts of so many millions as at this mo¬ 
ment. The forms under which it is professed may de¬ 
cay, for they, like all that is the work of man’s hands, 
are subject to the changes and chances of mortal being; 
but the spirit of truth is incorruptible; it may be de¬ 
veloped, illustrated, and applied; it never can die; it 
never can decline. 

No truth can perish; no truth can pass away. 
The flame is undying, though generations disappear. 
Wherever moral truth has started into being. Human¬ 
ity claims and guards the bequest. Each generation 
gathers together the imperishable children of the past, 
and increases them by new sons of light, alike radiant 
with immortality. 


WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNINa. 


Notembee, 1842. 

Let us rejoice, that in our own day the great doc¬ 
trine of Free Inquiry has been renewed, upheld, and 
more widely applied, by the refined intelligence and 
genial benevolence of William Ellery Channing. Free 
Inquiry was the great rule which he inculcated, not for 
the maturity of age only, but for the ardent curiosity 
of youth; for he knew that Freedom, far from leading 
to infidelity, strives for certainty, and is restless in 
pursuit of a well-grounded conviction. Freedom of 
mind he claimed, therefore, for every pursuit of the 
human faculties ; not for professors only, but for 
scholars; not in material science alone, but where 
authority had been most revered, in theology and the 
church. 

Nor did he confine this hberty to theoretic specu¬ 
lations ; he claimed it also in politics, and the theory 
of social relations. Not that he was a politician; Chan¬ 
ning could be classed with no political party. Fie stood 
aloof from them aU; and sought rather behind the 


WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING. 


437 


clouds of party strife, to discover the universal princi¬ 
ples that sway events and guide the centuries. He 
turned from men to the central light; he looked towards 
the region of absolute truth, of perfect justice. The 
laws of the moral world, as they come from the Eter¬ 
nal Mind, were the objects of his study; and he 
claimed for every man the right of calmly, fearlessly 
contemplating them, and of seeking to carry them into 
the affairs of life. What though enthusiasts might 
misunderstand and misapply them ? His only cure 
for impetuous fanaticism, was to seize clearly on the 
great precept which it blindly adopted; to substitute 
for the hastiness of zeal the persuasion of sincerity and 
the calmer conduct of wisdom. There is not a mo¬ 
ment, when the tendencies to reform do not assume a 
thousand visionary, strange and fantastic shapes. All 
this could not startle the purposes or alarm the serene 
mind of Channing. He knew that there w^as no way 
to dispel these forms of terror but by the light of chari¬ 
ty and reason; and he never swerved from his high 
career, whether of subjecting the institutions of our 
times to discussion, or applying the rules of universal 
morality to the business of the nation. 

With powers of such astonishing brilliancy as those 
which Channing possessed, united with his determined 
purpose of never allowing himself to be blinded to the ab¬ 
stract right by the fact of the existing law, it is not won¬ 
derful that his career should, by many, have been con- 


438 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


templated with apprehension and even with dread. 
For who could say to what revolutions the manly 
assertion of natural right might conduct ? Who could 
set a limit to the purposes of reform, when it demanded 
immediately the application of absolute truth? But 
death annihilates that alarm. The fear of sudden 
change by his agency, vanishes; and, from the re¬ 
cesses of conscience, immortal witnesses rise up to 
confirm his thriUing oracles. Prejudice before might 
confine his influence; by death prejudice is annihilated, 
and the echoes of his eloquence are heard beyond its ^ 
former bounds; as the fragrance of precious perfumes, 
when the vase that held them is broken, diffuses itself 
abroad without limits. 

And yet, while we lift up our own minds to receive 
the sublime lessons which he uttered, if we look back 
upon his life, we shall find his love of reform balanced 
by a love of order, and the expansive energies of his 
benevolence restrained by a spirit of conservatism. 

He was not the mariner who eagerly lifts the anchor, 
spreads all his canvas, and embarks on the ocean 
of experiment; he resembled rather the seer, who 
stands on the high cliff along the shore, and gazes 
to see what wind is rising, and gives his prayers, and 
his counsels and benedictions to the more adventurous, 
who set sail. And sometimes he would call back the 
enterprising reformer; nor would he attempt progress 


WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING. 


439 


by methods of disorder and riot, or even of party 
organization; he would rather postpone the estab¬ 
lishment -of a right than seek to assert it by blood¬ 
shed and violence; like the Jewish mother who sub¬ 
mitted to be mthheld from her offspring for a season, 
through fear lest, otherwise, her child should be rent 
in twain. 

And yet this abhorrence of violence hardly partook 
of timidity, certainly did not spring from a deficiency 
of decision. Did you consider his dehcate organ¬ 
ization, his light and frail frame, liis sensitiveness to 
agreeable impressions, the exquisite culture of his taste, 
you might apprehend a want of firmness; but it was 
not so. He towered above the mediocrity of society, 
hke the delicate and airy shafts of Melrose Abbey, of 
which the foliaged tracery seems woven of osier 
wreaths, and yet, as if changed by a fairy’s spell, 
proves to be of stone. Like them his purposes 
were diurable, unyielding, and aspiring to the skies. 
Even sympathy, that which he loved most, he sacrificed 
to duty; and gave up the present applause of those 
by whom he was surrounded, rather than fail to win 
tlie world for his audience, and coming generations for 
his fame. 

This firmness rested in an entire faith in moral 
power to renovate the race. Not the organized 
union of men, not temperance societies, not abohtioii 


440 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


societies, not conventions; moral power was to him 
the Egeria that dictated, the energy that accomplished 
reform. Hence, while he objected to associations, he 
was ever ready to advocate the great moral purposes 
for which men come together. Was he not among the 
first to rebuke the international selfishness that has so 
long held the commerce of the world in bonds ? Was 
he not among the first to raise his voice against the 
criminality of war, the opprobrium of humanity ? Who 
like him gathered the crowd to recognise the great 
lesson of temperance, carrying restoration to the de¬ 
sponding and feeble of will ? Who like him asserted 
the moral dignity of man, irrespective of wealth and 
rank? Indeed, one could hardly hear him on any 
public occasion, or even in private, but the great truth 
of man’s equality, as a consequence of his divine birth, 
struggled for utterance. He knew that man was made 
in the image of God; that the gift of reason opened to 
him the path to the knowledge of creation, and to mas¬ 
tery over its powers. Having the highest reverence 
for genius, he yet acknowledged the image of the divine 
original in every human being; and how often have his 
teachings repeated to many of us the doctrine so well 
‘ expressed by one of our own poets : 

“Nor scour the seas, nor sift mankind, 

A poet or a friend to find; 

Behold, he watches at the door. 

Behold his shadow on the floor; 


WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING. 


441 


* * ^ the Pariah hind 

Admits thee to the Perfect Mind/’ 

Hence Channing became the advocate of equality; 
recognised the power of the people as the great result 
of the modern centuries; and, knowing well that labor 
is the lot of man, that every mechanic art must be ex^r 
ercised, every service in life fulfilled, he sought to 
dignify labor and exalt its character; not to lift the 
laborer out of his class, but to elevate that class into 
the highest regions of moral culture and enjoyment. 
And his efibrts were in part at least rewarded. His 
words reached those for whose benefit they were 
spoken; and at his funeral, next to the fortitude with 
which his immediate friends had learned from him to 
bear affliction, the most touching spectacle was to see 
the laborers gathering near the aisles to pay one last 
tribute of gratitude to the remains of their counsellor. 

Nor could the clear mind of Channing turn from 
foUomng his convictions to their results, with all the 
power of dialectics that gained its warmth from be¬ 
nevolence, its energy from moral conviction. I remem¬ 
ber well the day when he first pubhely appeared as the 
advocate of the negro slave; after a discom'se of 
heart-rending eloquence, he did not so much complain 
of, as regret the want of sympathy. His gentle voice 
is hushed; his eye will not again flash on us indigna¬ 
tion ; the spiritual life that beamed from him is re¬ 
moved. Now that he is in his grave, now that the most 


442 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


timid can no longer fear from his influence divisions in 
church or in society, let us honor his memory by own¬ 
ing, that, in his main doctrine, he was in the right. 
Nor was his declaration respecting slavery an accidental 
phenomenon in his career; it lay at the very heart and 
core of his whole system of theology. His was a spirit 
that in its rapt trances sought intimate communion 
with the Divine; yet, shrinking ahke from the terror of 
flxed decrees and the fatalism of Pantheism, binding 
alike destiny and chance to the footstool of God’s throne, 
he was from the first an advocate for the free agency of 
man. This was the great central point of his theology, 
his morals, his metaphysics, his politics. Human free¬ 
dom under the sanction of moral power, human freedom 
as the prerogative of mind, human freedom as the ne¬ 
cessity of consciousness, human freedom as the in¬ 
destructible principle in the citadel of conscience,—^this 
was his whole theory; this animated his life; this 
alone led him into the fields of controversy; and in the 
full maturity of years, with that faith, and with the 
deep reverence for the Deity, which contemplates him 
always, and sees him every where, he could not but 
rush to the conclusion that slavery is a wrong; a crime 
against humanity as well as a crime against God. 

It was by degrees, after a struggle of years, 
that he burst the limits of social and sectarian narrow¬ 
ness, and rising ever higher and higher, became the 
advocate of universal truths and the champion of hu- 


WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING. 


443 


manity. Not a city, not a faction, the mystic voice of 
the universe inspired him; as I have seen an ^ohan 
harp placed at first where it failed to respond to the 
air, then lifted from bough to bough, higher and still 
higher, till at last it reached a point, where the winds 
of heaven breathed through it freely, and called forth 
music that seemed to descend from above. Channing 
was at first touched by the influence of a sect and a 
party, by the spirit of locality and narrower engage¬ 
ments; but he moved ever upward; till soaring far 
beyond a parish or a caste, a pohtical faction or a lim¬ 
ited polemical theology, in the higher sphere of his 
existence, the spirit of the world rushed fervidly amidst 
the trembling strings ; and 

From his sweet harp flew forth 

Immortal harmonies, of power to still 
AU passions born on earth. 

And draw the ardent will 
Its destiny of goodness to fulfil. 


ORATION, 


DELIVERED AT THE COMMEMORATION, IN WASHINGTON, OF THE 
DEATH OP ANDREW JACKSON, JUNE 2T, 1845. 

The men of the American revolution are no more. 
That age of creative power has passed away. The 
last surviving signer of the Declaration of Independence 
has long since left the earth. Washington lies near 
his own Potomac, surrounded by his family and his 
servants. Adams, the colossus of independence, re¬ 
poses in the modest grave-yard of his native region. 
Jefferson sleeps on the heights of his own MonticeUo, 
whence his eye overlooked his beloved Virginia. Mad¬ 
ison, the last survivor of the men who made our con¬ 
stitution, lives only in our hearts. But who shall say 
that the heroes, in whom the image of God shone most 
brightly, do not exist for ever ? They were filled with 
the vast conceptions which called America into being; 
they lived for those conceptions; and their deeds 
praise them. 

We are met to commemorate the virtues of one 
who shed his blood for our independence, took part in 


COMMEMORATION OP ANDREW JACKSON. 445 

winning the territory and forming the early institutions 
of the West, and was imbued with all the great ideas 
which constitute the moral force of our country. On 
the spot where he gave his solemn fealty to the peo¬ 
ple—here, where he pledged himself before the world 
to freedom, to the constitution, and to the laws—we 
meet to pay our tribute to the memory of the last great 
name, which gathers round itself all the associations 
that form the glory of America. 

South Carolina gave a birth-place to Andrew 
Jackson. On its remote frontier, far up on the 
forest-clad banks of the Catawba, in a region where 
the settlers were just beginning to cluster, his eye first 
saw the light. There his infancy sported in the an¬ 
cient forests, and his mind was nursed to freedom by 
their influence. He was the youngest son of an Irish 
emigrant, of Scottish origin, who, two years after the 
great war of Frederic of Prussia, fled to America for 
relief from indigence and oppression. His birth was in 
1767, at a time when the people of our land were but 
a body of dependent colonists, scarcely more than two 
millions in number, scattered along an immense coast, 
with no army, or navy, or union; and exposed to the 
attempts of England to control America by the aid of 
military force. His boyhood grew up in the midst of 
the contest with Great Britain. The first great politi¬ 
cal truth that reached his heart, was, that all men are 


446 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


free and equal ; the first great fact that beamed on his 
understanding, was his country’s independence. 

The strife, as it increased, came near the shades of 
his own upland residence. As a boy of thirteen, he 
witnessed the scenes of horror that accompany civil 
war; and when but a year older, with an elder brother, 
he shouldered his musket, and went forth to strike a 
blow for his country. 

Joyous era for America and for humanity I But 
for him, the orphan boy, the events were full of agony 
and grief. His father was no more. His oldest 
brother fell a victim to the war of the revolution; 
another, his companion in arms, died of wounds 
received in their joint captivity; his mother went 
down to the grave a victim to grief and efibrts to 
rescue her sons; and when peace came, he was alone 
in the world, with no kindred to cherish him, and 
httle inheritance but his own untried powers. 

The nation which emancipated itself from British / 
rule organizes itself; the confederation gives way to / 
the constitution; the perfecting of that constitution— i 
that grand event of the thousand years of modem his- » 
tory—^is accomplished; America exists as a people, > 
gains unity as a government, and assumes its place j 
among the nations of the earth. 

The next great office to be performed by America, 
is the taking possession of the wilderness. The mag¬ 
nificent western valley cried out to the civilization of 


COMMEMORATION OP ANDREW JACKSON. 447 

popular power, that the season had come for its occu¬ 
pation by cultivated man. 

Behold, then, our orphan hero, sternly earnest, 
consecrated to humanity from childhood by sorrow, 
having neither father, nor mother, nor sister, nor sur¬ 
viving brother, so young and yet so solitary, and 
therefore bound the more closely to collective man—• 
behold him elect for his lot to go forth and assist in 
laying the foundations of society in the great valley of 
the Mississippi. 

At the very time when Washington was pledging his 
own and future generations to the support of the 
popular institutions which were to be the light of the 
human race—at the time when the governments of the 
Old World were rocking to their centre, and the 
mighty fabric that had come down from the middle 
ages was falling in—^the adventimous Jackson, in the 
radiant glory and boundless hope and confident in¬ 
trepidity of twenty-one, plunged into the wilderness, 
crossed the great mountain-barrier that divides the 
western waters from the Atlantic, followed the paths of 
the early hunters and fugitives, and, not content with 
the nearer neighborhood to his parent State, went still 
further and further to the west, till he found his home 
in the most beautiful region on the Cumberland. 
There, from the first, he was recognised as the great 
pioneer; and in his courage, the coming emigrants 
were sure to find a shield. 


448 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


The lovers of adventure began to pour themselves 
into the territory, whose delicious climate and fertile 
soil invited the presence of social man. The hunter, 
with his rifle and his axe, attended by his wife and 
children; the herdsman, driving the few cattle that 
were to multiply as they browsed; the cultivator of 
the soilj—all came to the inviting region. Wherever 
the bending mountains opened a pass—^wherever the 
buffaloes and the beasts of the forest had made a trace, 
these sons of nature, children of humanity, in the 
highest sentiment of personal freedom, came to oc¬ 
cupy the lovely wilderness, whose prairies blossomed 
every where profusely with 'wild flowers—whose 
woods in spring put to shame, by their magnificence, 
the cultivated gardens of man. 

And now that these unlettered fugitives, educated 
only by the spirit of freedom, destitute of dead letter 
erudition, but sharing the living ideas of the age, had 
made their homes in the West, what would follow? 
Would they degrade themselves to ignorance and infi¬ 
delity ? Would they make the solitudes of the desert ex¬ 
cuses for licentiousness ? Would the hatred of exces¬ 
sive restraint lead them to live in unorganized society, 
destitute of laws and fixed institutions ? 

At a time when European society was becoming 
broken in pieces, scattered, disunited, and resolved 
into its elements, a scene ensued in Tennessee, than 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 449 


which nothing more beautifully grand is recorded in 
the annals of the race. 

These adventuj:^rs in the wilderness longed to 
come together in organized society. The overshadow¬ 
ing genius of their time inspired them mth good 
designs, and filled them with the counsels of wisdom. 
Dwellers in the forest, freest of the free, bound in the 
spirit, they came up by their representatives, on foot, 
on horseback, through the forest, along the streams, by 
the buffalo traces, by the Indian paths, by the blazed 
forest avenues, to meet in convention among the moun¬ 
tains of Knoxville, and de\dse for themselves a consti¬ 
tution. Andrew Jackson was there, the greatest man 
of them all—^modest, bold, determined, demanding 
nothing for himself, and shrinking from nothing that 
his heart approved. 

The convention came together on the eleventh day 
of January, 1796, and finished its work on the sixth 
day of February. How had the msdom of the Old 
World vainly tasked itself to devise constitutions, that 
coidd, at least, be the subject of experiment. The men 
of Tennessee, in less than twenty-five days, perfected a 
fabric, which, in its essential forms, was to last for 
ever. They came together, full of faith and reverence, 
of love to humanity, of confidence in truth. In the 
simplicity of wisdom they constructed their system, 
acting under higher influences than they were con¬ 
scious of; 


29 


450 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


They wrought in sad sincerity, 

Themselves from God they could not free; 

They builded better than they knew; 

The conscious stones to beauty grew. 

In the instrmnent which they adopted, they em¬ 
bodied their faith in God, and in the immortal nature 
of man. They gave the right of suffrage to every 
freeman; they vindicated the sanctity of reason, by 
securing freedom of speech and of the press; they 
reverenced the voice of God, as it speaks in the soul, 
by asserting the indefeasible right of man to worship 
the Infinite according to his conscience; they estab¬ 
lished the freedom and equahty of elections ; and they 
demanded from every future legislator a solemn oath, 
‘‘ never to consent to any act or thing whatever that 
shall have even a tendency to lessen the rights of the 
people.” 

These majestic lawgivers, wiser than the Solons, 
and Lycurguses, and Numas of the Old World,—these 
prophetic founders of a State, who embodied in their 
constitution the sublimest truths of humanity, acted 
without reference to human praises. They took no 
pains to vaunt their deeds; and when their work was 
done, knew not that they had finished one of the sub¬ 
limest acts ever performed among men. They left no 
record, ns to whose agency was conspicuous, whose 
eloquence swayed, whose generous will predominated ; 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 451 


nor should we know, but for tradition, confirmed by 
what followed among themselves. 

The men of Tennessee were now a people, and 
they were to send forth a man to stand for them in the 
Congress of the United States—that avenue to glory— 
that home of eloquence—the citadel of popular power; 
and, with one consent, they united in selecting the 
foremost man among their lawgivers — Andrew 
Jackson. 

The love of his constituents followed him to the 
American Congress ; and he had served but a single 
term when the State of Tennessee made him one of 
its representatives in the American Senate, of which 
Jefferson was at the time the presiding officer. 

Thus, when he was scarcely more than thirty, he 
had guided the settlement of the wilderness; swayed 
the deliberations of a people in establishing their fim- 
damental laws; acted as their representative, and again 
as the representative of his organized commonwealth, 
disciplined to a knowledge of the power of the people 
and the power of the States; the associate of repub¬ 
lican statesmen, the friend and companion of Jefferson. 

The men who framed the Constitution of the United 
States, many of them did not know the innate life and 
self-preserving energy of their work. They feared that 
freedom could not endure, and they planned a strong 
government for its protection. During his short career 
in Congress, Jackson showed his quiet, deeply-seated, 


452 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


innate, intuitive faith in human freedom, and in the in¬ 
stitutions which rested on that faith. He was ever, by 
his votes and opinions, found among those who had con¬ 
fidence in humanity; and in the great division of minds, 
this child of the woodlands, this representative of forest 
life in the West, appeared modestly and firmly on the 
side of liberty. It did not occur to him to doubt the 
right of man to the free development of his powers; it 
did not occur to him to place a guardianship over the 
people; it did not occur to him to seek to give dura¬ 
bility to popular institutions, by conceding to govern¬ 
ment a strength independent of popular will. 

Prom the first, he was attached to the fundamental 
doctrines of popular power, and of the policy that 
favors it; and though his reverence for Washington 
surpassed his reverence for any human being, he voted 
against the address from the House of Representatives 
to Washington on his retirement, because its language 
appeared to sanction the financial policy which he be- 
heved hostile to the true principles of a republic. 

During his period of service in the Senate, Jackson 
was elected major general by the brigadiers and field 
officers of the militia of Tennessee. Resigning his 
place in the Senate, he was made judge of the supreme 
court in law and equity; such was the confidence in 
his clearness of judgment, his vigor of wiU, and his in¬ 
tegrity of purpose, to deal justly among the turbulent 
who crowded into the new settlements of Tennessee. 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 453 

Thus, in the short period of nine years, Andrew 
Jackson was signalized by as many evidences of public 
esteem as could fall to the lot of man. The pioneer 
of the wilderness, the defender of its stations, he was 
the lawgiver of a new people, their sole representative 
in Congress, the representative of the State in the 
Senate, the highest in military command, the highest 
in judicial office. He seemed to be recognised as the 
first in love of liberty, in the science of legislation, in 
sagacity, and integrity. 

Delighting in private life, he would have resigned his 
place on the bench; but the whole countiy demanded 
his continued service. ‘‘Nature,” they cried, “never 
designed that your powers of thought and indepen¬ 
dence of mind should be lost in retirement.” But 
after a few years, relieving himself from the cares of 
the court, he gave himself to the activity and the inde¬ 
pendent life of a husbandman. He carried into retire¬ 
ment the fame of natural intelligence, and 'was cher¬ 
ished as “a prompt, frank, and ardent sold.” His 
vigor of character gave him the lead among all with 
whom he associated, and his name was famdiarly spo¬ 
ken round every hearth-stone in Tennessee. Men 
loved to discuss his qualities. AH discerned his power, 
and when the vehemence and impetuosity of his nature 
were observed upon, there were not wanting those who 
saw, beneath the blazing fires of his genius, the solidity 
of his judgment. 


454 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


His hospitable roof sheltered the emigrant and the 
pioneer; and, as they made their Avay to their new 
homes, they filled the mountain sides and the valleys 
with his praise. 

Connecting himself, for a season, with a man of 
business, Jackson soon discerned the misconduct of his 
associate. It marked his character, that he insisted, 
himself, on paying every obligation that had been con¬ 
tracted; and, rather than endmn the vassalage of 
debt, he instantly parted with the rich domain which 
his early enterprise had acquired—^with his own man¬ 
sion—^with the fields which he himself had first tamed 
to the ploughshare—^^vith the forest whose trees were 
as familiar to him as his friends—and chose rather to 
dwell, for a time, in a rude log cabin, in the pride 
of independence and integrity. 

On all great occasions, his influence was deferred 
to. When Jefferson had acquired for the country 
the whole of Louisiana, and there seemed some 
hesitancy, on the part of Spain, to acknowledge our 
possession, the services of Jackson were solicited by 
the national administration, and would have been called 
into fuU exercise, but for the peaceful termination of 
the incidents that occasioned the summons. 

In the long series of aggressions on the freedom of 
the seas, and the rights of the American flag, Jackson, 
though in his inland home the roar of the breakers 
was never heard and the mariner never was seen, re- 


COMMEMORATION OP ANDREW JACKSON. 455 


sented the injuries wantonly inflicted on our commerce 
and on our sailors, and adhered to the new maritime 
code of republicanism. 

When the continuance of wrong compelled the 
nation to resort to arms, Jackson, led by the instinctive 
knowledge of his own greatness, yet with true modesty 
of nature, confessed his willingness to be employed on 
the Canada frontier; and aspired to the command to 
which Winchester was appointed. We may ask, what 
would have been the result, if the conduct of the 
north-western army had, at the opening of the war, 
been intrusted to a man who, in action, was ever so 
fortunate, that he seemed to have made destiny capitu¬ 
late to his vehement will ? 

The path of duty led him in another direction. On 
the declaration of war, twenty-five hundred volunteers 
had risen at his word to follow his standard; but, by 
countermanding orders from the seat of government, 
the movement was without efiect. 

A new and greater danger hung over the West. 
The Indian tribes were to make one last eflbrt to 
restore it to its solitude, and recover it for savage life. 
The brave, relentless Shawnees—^who, from time im¬ 
memorial, had strolled from the waters of the Ohio to 
the rivers of Alabama—^were animated by Tecumseh 
and his brother the Prophet, speaking to them as 
with the voice of the Great Spirit, and urging the 
Creek nation to desperate massacres. Their ruthless 


456 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


cruelty spared neither sex nor age; the infant and 
its mother, the planter and his family, who had fled 
for refuge to the fortress, the garrison that capitu¬ 
lated,—all were slain, and not a vestige of defence was 
left in the comitry. The cry of the West demanded 
Jackson for its defender; and though his arm was then 
fractured by a ball, and hung in a sling, he placed him¬ 
self at the head of the volunteers of Tennessee, and 
resolved to terminate for ever the hereditary struggle. 

Who can tell the horrors of that campaign ? Who 
can paint rightly the obstacles which Jackson over¬ 
came—^mountains, the scarcity of untenanted forests, 
winter, the failure of supplies from the settlements, the 
insubordination of troops, mutiny, menaces of deser¬ 
tion? Who can measure the wonderful power over 
men, by which his personal prowess and attractive 
energy drew them in midwinter from their homes, 
across mountains and morasses, and through tracldess 
deserts ? Who can describe the personal heroism of 
Jackson, never sparing himself, beyond any of his men 
encountering toil and fatigue, sharing every labor of the 
camp and of the march, foremost in every danger; 
giving up his horse to the invalid soldier, while he 
himself waded through the swamps on foot? None 
equalled him in power of endurance; and the private 
soldiers, as they found him passing them on the march, 
exclaimed, He is as tough as the hickory.” ‘‘ Yes,” 
they cried to one another, “there goes Old Hickory! ” 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 457 

Then followed the memorable events of the double 
battles of Emuckfaw, and the glorious victory of Toho- 
peka, where the anger of the general against the falter¬ 
ing was more appaUing than the war-whoop and the 
rifle of the savage; the fiercely contested field of 
Enotochopco, where the general, as he attempted to 
draw his sword to cut down a flying colonel who 
was leading a regiment from the field, broke again the 
arm which was but newly knit together; and, quietly 
replacing it in the sling, wdth his commanding voice 
arrested the flight of the troops, and himself led them 
back to victory. 

In six short months of vehement action, the most 
terrible Indian war in our annals was brought to a 
close; the prophets were silenced; the consecrated 
region of the Creek nation reduced. Through scenes 
of blood, the avenging hero sought only the path to 
peace. Thus Alabama, a part of Mississippi, a part 
of his own Tennessee, and the highway to the Eloridas, 
were his gifts to the Union. These were his trophies. 

Genius as extraordinary as military events can call 
forth, was summoned into action in this rapid, effi¬ 
cient, and most fortunately conducted w^ar. The hero 
descended the water-courses of Alabama to the neigh¬ 
borhood of Pensacola, and longed to plant the eagle of 
his country on its battlements. 

Time would fail, and words be wanting, were I to 
dwell on the magical influencee of his appearance in 


458 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


New Orleans. His presence dissipated gloom and 
dispelled alarm; at once he changed the aspect of 
despair into a confidence of security and a hope of 
acquiring glory. Every man knows the tale of the 
sudden, and yet deliberate daring which led him, on 
the night of the twenty-third of December, to precipi¬ 
tate his little army on his foes, in the thick darkness, 
before they grew familiar with their encampment, scat¬ 
tering dismay through veteran regiments of England, 
defeating them, and arresting their progress by a 
far inferior force. 

Who shall recount the counsels of prudence, the 
kindling words of eloquence, that gushed from his lips 
to cheer his soldiers, his skirmishes and battles, till 
that eventful morning when the day at Bunker HiU 
had its fulfilment in the glorious battle of New Or¬ 
leans, and American independence stood before the 
world in the majesty of triumphant power ! 

These were great victories for the nation; over 
himself he won a greater. Had not Jackson been 
renowned for the impetuosity of his passions, for his 
defiance of others’ authority, and the unbending vigor 
of his self-will? Behold the savior of Louisiana, all 
garlanded with victory, viewing around him the city he 
had preserved, the maidens and children whom his 
heroism had protected, yet standing in the presence of 
a petty judge, who gratifies his wounded vanity by an 
abuse of his judicial power. Every breast in the 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 459 


crowded audience heaves with indignation. He, the 
passionate, the impetuous,—^he whose power was to 
be humbled, whose honor questioned, whose laurels 
tarnished, alone stood sublimely serene; and when the 
craven judge trembled, and faltered, and dared not 
proceed, himself, the arraigned one, bade him take 
courage, and stood by the law even when the law was 
made the instrument of insult and wrong on himself 
at the moment of his most perfect claim to the highest 
civic honors. 

His country, when it grew to hold many more mil¬ 
lions, the generation that then was coming in, has risen 
up to do homage to the magnanimity of that hour. 
Woman, whose feeling is always right, did honor from 
the first to the purity of his heroism. The people of 
Louisiana, to the latest age, will cherish his name as 
their greatest benefactor. 

The culture of Jackson’s mind had been much pro¬ 
moted by his services and associations in the war. 
His discipline of himself as the chief in command, his 
intimate relations with men like Livingston, the won¬ 
derful deeds in which he bore a part, all matured his 
judgment and mellowed his character. 

Peace came with its delights; once more the coun¬ 
try rushed forward m the development of its powers; 
once more the arts of industry healed the wounds 
that war had inflicted ; and, from commerce and 
agriculture and manufactures, wealth gushed abun- 


460 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


dantly under the free activity of unrestrained enter¬ 
prise. And Jackson returned to his own fields and his 
own pursuits, to cherish his plantation, to care for his 
servants, to enjoy the affection of the most kind and 
devoted wife, whom he respected with the gentlest 
deference, and loved with a spotless purity. 

There he stood, like one of the mightiest forest 
trees of his own West, vigorous and colossal, sending 
its summit to the skies, and growing on its native soil 
in wild and inimitable magnificence, careless of behold¬ 
ers. Prom every part of the country he received ap¬ 
peals to his political ambition, and the severe modesty 
of his weU-balanced mind turned them all aside. He 
was happy in his farm, happy in seclusion, happy in 
his family, happy within liimself. 

But the passions of the southern Indians were not 
allayed by the peace with Great Britain; and foreign 
emissaries were still among them, to inflame and direct 
their malignity. Jackson was called forth by his 
country to restrain the cruelty of the treacherous and 
unsparing Seminoles. It was in the train of the events 
of this war that he placed the American eagle on St. 
Mark’s and above the ancient towers of St. Augustine. 
His deeds in that war, of themselves, form a monument 
to human power, to the celerity of his genius, to the 
creative fertility of his resources, to his intuitive 
sagacity. As Spain, in his judgment, had committed 
aggressions, he would have emancipated her islands; of 



COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 461 


the Havana, he caused the reconnoissance to be 
made; and, mth an army of five thousand men, he 
stood ready to guaranty her redemption from colonial 
thraldom. 

But when peace was restored, and his office was 
accomphshed, his physical strength sunk under the 
pestilential influence of the climate, and, fast yielding 
to disease, he was borne in a litter across the swamps 
of Florida towards his home. It was Jackson’s char¬ 
acter that he never solicited aid from any one; but he 
never forgot those who rendered him service in the 
hour of need. At a time when aU around him believed 
him near his end, his ^vife hastened to his side; and, 
by her tenderness and nursing care, her patient as¬ 
siduity, and the soothing influence of devoted love, 
withheld him from the grave. 

He would have remained quietly at his home, 
but that he was privately informed, his conduct 
was to be attainted by some intended congres¬ 
sional proceedings; he came, therefore, into the pres¬ 
ence of the people’s representatives at Washington, 
only to vindicate his name; and, when that was 
achieved, he once more returned to his seclusion 
among the groves of the Hermitage. 

It was not his own ambition which brought him 
again to the public view. The affection of Tennessee 
compelled him to resume a seat on the floor of the 
American Senate, and, after a long series of the in- 


462 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


tensest political strife, Andrew Jackson was elected 
President of the United States. 

Par from advancing his own pretensions, he always 
kept them back, and had for years repressed the 
solicitations of his friends to become a candidate. 
He felt sensibly that he was devoid of scientific 
culture, and little familiar with letters; and he never 
obtruded his opinions, or preferred claims to place. 
But, whenever his advice was demanded, he was 
always ready to pronounce it ; and whenever his 
country invoked his services, he did not shrink even 
from the station which had been filled by the most 
cultivated men our nation had produced. 

Behold, then, the unlettered man of the West, the 
nm’sling of the wilds, the farmer of the Hermitage, 
little versed in books, unconnected by science with the 
traditions of the past, raised by the will of the people to 
the highest pinnacle of honor, to the central post in the 
civilization of repubhcan freedom, to the office where 
all the powers of the earth would watch his actions— 
where his words would be repeated through the world, 
and his spirit be the moving star to guide the nations. 
Wliat policy will he pursue? What wisdom will he 
bring with him from the forest ? What rules of duty 
Avill he evolve from the oracles of his own mind ? 

The man of the West came as the inspired prophet 
of the West; he came as one free from the bonds of 
hereditary or established custom; he came with no su- 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 463 


perior but conscience, no oracle but his native judg¬ 
ment ; and, true to his origin and his education, true 
to the conditions and circumstances of his advance¬ 
ment, he valued right more than usage; he reverted 
from the pressure of established interests to the energy 
of first principles. 

We tread on ashes, where the fire is not yet extin¬ 
guished ; yet not to dwell on his career as President, 
were to leave out of view the grandest illustrations of 
his magnanimity. 

The legislation of the United States had followed 
the precedents of the legislation of European mon¬ 
archies ; it was the office of Jackson to lift the coun¬ 
try out of the European forms of legislation, and to 
open to it a career resting on American sentiment and 
American freedom. He would have freedom every 
where—freedom under the restraints of right; freedom 
of industry, of commerce, of mind, of universal action; 
freedom, unshackled by restrictive privileges, unre¬ 
strained by the thraldom of monopolies. 

The unity of his mind and his consistency were with¬ 
out a parallel. Guided by natural dialectics, he devel¬ 
oped the political doctrines that suited every emergency, 
with a precision and a harmony that no theorist could 
hope to equal. On every subject in politics, he was 
thoroughly and profoundly and immovably radical; 
and would sit for hours, and in a continued flow of 
remark make the application of his principles to every 


464 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


question that could arise in legislation, or in the inter¬ 
pretation of the constitution. 

His expression of himself was so clear, that his in¬ 
fluence pervaded not our land only, but all America 
and all mankind. They say that, in the physical 
world, the magnetic fluid is so diffused, that its vibra¬ 
tions are discernible simultaneously in every part of the 
globe. So it is with the element of freedom. And as 
Jackson developed its doctrines from their source in the 
mind of humanity, the popular sympathy was moved 
and agitated throughout the world, tiU his name grew 
every where to be the symbol of popular power. 

Himself the witness of the ruthlessness of savage 
life, he planned the removal of the Indian tribes 
beyond the limits of the organized States; and it is 
the result of his determined policy that the region east 
of the Mississippi has been transferred to the exclusive 
possession of cultivated man. 

A pupil of the wilderness, his heart was with the 
pioneers of American life towards the setting sun. 
He longed to secure to the emigrant, not pre-emp¬ 
tion rights only, but more than pre-emption rights. 
He longed to invite labor to take possession of the un¬ 
occupied fields without money and without price; with 
no obligation except the perpetual devotion of itself by 
allegiance to its country. Under the beneficent influ¬ 
ence of his opinions, the sons of misfortune, the chil¬ 
dren of adventure, find their way to the uncultivated 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 465 

West. There in some wilderness glade, or in the thick 
forest of the fertile plain, or where the prairies most 
sparkle with flowers, they, like the wild bee which sets 
them the example of industry, may choose their home, 
mark the extent of their possessions by driving stakes 
or blazing trees, shelter their log-cabin with boughs 
and turf, and teach the virgin soil to yield itself to the 
ploughshare. Theirs shall be the soil; theirs the beau¬ 
tiful farms which they teach to be productive. Come, 
children of sorrow! you on whom the Old World 
frowns; crowd fearlessly to the forests; plant your 
homes in confidence, for the country watches over you; 
your children grow around you as hostages, and the 
wilderness, at your bidding, surrenders its grandeur of 
useless luxuriance to the beauty and loveliness of 
culture. Yet beautiful and lovely as is this scene, it 
stni by far falls short of the ideal which lived in the 
affections of Jackson. 

It would be a sin against the occasion, were I to 
omit to commemorate the deep devotedness of Jackson 
to the cause and to the rights of the laboring classes. 
It was for their welfare that he defied all the 
storms of political hostihty. He desired to ensure to 
them the fruits of their own industry; and he unceas¬ 
ingly opposed every system which tended to lessen 
their reward, or which exposed them to be defrauded 
of their dues. They may bend over his grave with 
affectionate sorrow; for never, in the tide of time, 


30 


466 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


did a statesman exist more heartily resolved to protect 
them in their rights, and to advance their happiness. 
Eor their benefit, he opposed partial legislation; for 
their benefit, he resisted all artificial methods of con- 
troUing labor, and subjecting it to capital. It v^as 
for their benefit that he loved freedom in aU its 
forms—freedom of the individual in personal inde¬ 
pendence, freedom of the States as separate sovereign¬ 
ties. He never would listen to counsels which tended 
to the concentration of power, the subjecting general 
labor to a central will. The true American system 
presupposes the diffusion of freedom—organized life 
in all the parts of the American body politic, as there 
is organized life in every part of the human system. 
His vindication of the just principles of the constitution 
derived its subhmity from his deep conviction, that this 
strict construction is required by the lasting welfare of 
the great laboring classes of the United States. 

To this end, Jackson revived the tribunicial power 
of the veto, and exerted it against the decisive action 
of both branches of Congress, against the votes, the 
wishes, the entreaties of personal and political friends. 
“ Show me,” was his reply to them, “ show me an 
express clause in the constitution, authorizing Congress 
to take the business of State legislatures out of their 
hands.” ‘‘ You will ruin us all,” cried a firm partisan 
friend ; “ you will ruin your party and your own pros¬ 
pects.” '‘Providence,” answered Jackson, “wiU take 
care of me ; ” and he persevered. 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 467 

In proceeding to discharge the debt of the United 
States—a measure thoroughly American—Jackson fol¬ 
lowed the example of his predecessors; but he followed 
it with the full consciousness that he was rescuing the 
country from the artificial system of finance which had 
prevailed tlu’oughout the world; and with him it 
formed a part of a system by w^hich American legis¬ 
lation was to separate itself more and more effectually 
from European precedents, and develope itself more and 
more, according to the vital principles of our political 
existence. 

The discharge of the debt brought with it a great 
reduction of the public burdens, and brought, of 
necessity, into view, the question, how far America 
should follow, of choice, the old restrictive policy of 
high duties, under which Europe had oppressed Ameri¬ 
ca ; or how far she shoidd rely on her own freedom, 
enterprise, and power, defying the competition, seeking 
the markets, and receiving the products of the world, 
in The mind of Jackson on this subject reasoned 
/ clearly, and without passion. In the abuses of the 
system of revenue by excessive imposts, he saw evils 
which the public mind would remedy; and, incHning 
with, the whole might of his energetic nature to the 
side of revenue duties, he made his earnest but tranquil 
appeal to the judgment of the people. 

The portions of country that suffered most severely 
from a course of legislation, which, in its extreme char- 


468 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


acter as it then existed, is now universally acknow¬ 
ledged to have been unequal and unjust, were less 
tranquil; and rallying on those doctrines of freedom, 
which make our government a limited one, they saw 
in the oppressive acts an assumption of power which 
of itself was nugatory, because it was exercised, as 
they held, without authority from the people. 

The contest that ensued was the most momentous 
in our annals. The greatest minds of America en¬ 
gaged in the discussion. Eloquence never achieved 
sublimer triumphs in the American Senate than on 
those occasions. The country became deeply divided; 
and the antagonist elements were arrayed against each 
other under forms of clashing authority menacing civil 
war; the freedom of the several States was invoked 
against the power of the United States; and under the 
organization of a State in convention, the reserved 
rights of the people were summoned to display their 
energy, and balance the authority and neutralize the 
legislation of the central government. The States 
were agitated with prolonged excitement; the friends 
of liberty throughout the world looked on with divided 
sympathies, praying that the American Union might 
be perpetual, and also that the commerce of the world 
might be free. 

Eortunately for the country, and fortunately for 
mankind, Andrew Jackson was at the helm of state, 
the representative of the principles that were to allay 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 469 


the storm, and to restore the hopes of peace and free¬ 
dom. By nature, by impulse, by education, by con¬ 
viction, a friend to personal freedom—by education, 
political sympathies, and the fixed habit of his mind, a 
friend to the rights of the States—unwilling that the 
liberty of the States should be trampled underfoot— 
unwilling that the government should lose its vigor or 
be impaired, he rallied for the constitution; and in its 
name he published to the world, “ The Union : it 
MUST BE PRESERVED.” The words were a spell to 
hush evil passion, and to remove oppression. Under 
his effective guidance, the favored interests, which had 
struggled to perpetuate unjust legislation, yielded to 
the voice of moderation and reform; and every mind 
that had for a moment contemplated a rupture of the 
States, discarded it for ever. The whole inffuence of 
the past was invoked in favor of the federal system; 
from the council chambers of the fathers, who moulded 
our institutions—from the haU where American inde¬ 
pendence was declared, the clear, loud cry was uttered— 
‘‘ the Union: it must be preserved.” From every 
battle field of the revolution—from Lexington and Bun¬ 
ker Hill—from Saratoga and Yorktown—from the fields 
of Eutaw and King’s Mountain—from the cane-brakes 
that sheltered the men of Marion—the repeated, long- 
prolonged echoes came up—‘‘ the Union: it must be pre¬ 
served.” From every valley in our land—from every 
cabin on the pleasant mountain sides—^from the ships at 


470 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


our wharves—from the tents of the hunter in our west¬ 
ernmost prairies—from the living minds of the living 
milhons of American freemen—^from the thickly coming 
glories of futurity—the shout went up, like the sound 
of many waters, “ the Union: it must be preserved.’’ 
The friends of the protective system, and they who 
had denounced the protective system—^the statesmen 
of the North, that had wounded the constitution in 
their love of increased pewer at the centre—the states¬ 
men of the South, whose ingenious acuteness had carried 
to its extreme the theory of State rights—all conspired 
together; all breathed prayers for the perpetuity of the 
Union. Under the prudent firmness of Jackson, by 
the mixture of justice and general regard for all 
interests, the greatest danger to our country was turned 
aside, and mankind was encouraged to beheve that our 
Union, like our freedom, is imperishable. 

The moral of the great events of those days is this : 
that the people can discern right, and will make their 
way to a knowledge of right; that the whole human 
mind, and therefore with it the mind of the nation, 
has a continuous, ever improving existence ;j|that the 
'appeal from the unjust legislation of to-day must be 
made quietly, earnestly, perseveringly, to the more en¬ 
lightened collective reason of to-morrow ; that submis¬ 
sion is due to the popular will, in the confidence that 
the people, when in error, will amend their doings; 
that in a popular government injustice is neither to be 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 471 


established by force, nor to be resisted by force; in a 
word, that the Union, which was constituted by con¬ 
sent, must be preserved by love. 

It rarely falls to the happy lot of a statesman to 
receive such unanimous applause from the heart of a 
nation. Duty to the dead demands that, on this occa¬ 
sion, the course of measures should not pass unnoticed, 
in the progress of which, his vigor of character most 
clearly appeared, and his conflict with opposing parties 
was most violent and protracted. 

From his home in Tennessee, Jackson came to the 
presidency, resolved to lift American legislation out of 
the forms of English legislation, and to place our laws 
on the currency in harmony with the principles of our 
republic. He came to the presidency of the United 
States determined to deliver the government from the 
Bank of the United States, and to restore the regu¬ 
lation of exchanges to the rightful depository of that 
power—the commerce of the country. He had de¬ 
signed to declare his views on this subject in his 
inaugural address, but was persuaded to relinquish 
that purpose, on the ground that it belonged rather to 
a legislative message. When the period for addressing 
Congress drew near, it was still urged, that to attack 
the bank would forfeit his popularity and secure his 
future defeat. “It is not,” he answered, “it is not 
for myself that I care.” It was urged that haste was 
unnecessaiy, as the bank had still six unexpended 


472 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


years of chartered existence. I may die,” he rephed, 
before another Congress comes together, and I could 
not rest quietly in my grave, if I faded to do what I 
hold so essential to the liberty of my country.” And 
his first annual message announced to the people 
that the bank was neither constitutional nor expedient. 
In this he was in advance of the friends about him, in 
advance of Congress, and in advance of his party. 
This is no time for the analysis of measures or the 
discussion of questions of political economy; on the 
present occasion, we have to contemplate the character 
of the man. 

Never, from the first moment of his administration 
to the last, was there a calm in the strife of parties on 
the subject of the currency; and never, during the 
whole period, did he recede or falter. Remaining 
always in advance of his party, always having near 
him friends who cowered before the hardihood of 
his courage, he himself was unmoved, from the first 
suggestion of the unconstitutionality of the bank, 
to the moment when first of aU, reasoning from the 
certain tendency of its policy, he with singular sagacity 
predicted to unbelieving friends the coming insolvency 
of the institution. 

The storm throughout the country rose with unex¬ 
ampled vehemence; his opponents were not satisfied 
with addressing the public, or Congress, or his cabinet; 
they threw their whole force personally on him. Prom 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 473 


all parts men pressed around him, urging him, entreat¬ 
ing him to bend. Congress was flexible; many of his 
personal friends faltered; the impetuous swelling wave 
rolled on, without one sufficient obstacle, till it reached 
his presence; but, as it dashed in its highest fury at 
his feet, it broke before his firmness. The command¬ 
ing majesty of his will appalled his opponents and 
revived his friends. He, himself, had a proud con¬ 
sciousness that his wiU was indomitable. Standing 
over the Rip Raps, and looking out upon the 
ocean, “Providence,’’ said he to a friend, “Provi¬ 
dence may change my determination; but man no 
more can do it than he can remove these Rip Raps, 
which have resisted the roUing of the ocean from the 
beginning of time.” And though a panic was spread¬ 
ing through the land, and the whole credit system as it 
then existed was crumbling to pieces and crashing 
around him, he stood erect, hke a massive cohunn, 
which the heaps of falling ruins could not break, nor 
bend, nor sway from its fixed foundation. 

In the relations of this country to the world. Jack- 
son demanded for America equality. The time was 
come for her to take her place over against the most 
ancient and most powerful states of the Old World, 
and to gain the recognition of her pretensions. He 
revived the unadjusted claims for injuries to our com¬ 
merce, committed in the wantonness of European hos¬ 
tilities; and he taught the American merchant and 


474 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


the American sailor to repose confidingly under the 
sanctity of the American fiag. Nor would he con¬ 
sent that the payment of indemnities which were 
due, should be withheld or delayed. Even against 
France, the veteran of the West enforced the just 
demand of America, with a heroic vigor which 
produced an abiding impression on the world. He 
did this in the love of peace. “You have set your 
name to the most important document of your public 
life,” said one of his cabinet to him, as he signed the 
annual message that treated of the unpaid indemnity. 
“This paper may produce a war.”—“ There will be no 
war,” answered Jackson, decisively; and rising on his 
feet, as was his custom when he spoke warmly, he ex¬ 
pressed with solemnity his hatred of war, bearing 
witness to its horrors, and protesting against its 
crimes. He loved peace; and to secure permanent 
tranquillity, he made the rule for his successors, as 
well as for himself, in the intercourse of America with 
foreign powers, “ to demand nothing but what is right, 
and to submit to nothing that is wrong.” 

People of the District of Columbia: I should fail 
of a duty on this occasion, if I did not give utterance 
to your sentiment of gratitude which followed General 
Jackson into retirement. This beautiful city, sur¬ 
rounded by heights the most attractive, watered by a 
river so magnificent, the home of the gentle and the cul¬ 
tivated, not less than the seat of political power—this 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 475 


city, whose site Washington had selected, was dear to 
his affections; and if he won your grateful attachment 
by adorning it with monuments of useful architecture, 
by establishing its credit, and relieving it of its burdens, 
he regretted only that he had not the opportunity to 
have connected himself still more intimately with yoiu* 
prosperity. When he took leave of the District, the 
population of this city, and the masses from its vi¬ 
cinity, followed his carriage in crowds. All in silence 
stood near him, to wish him adieu; and as the ears 
started, and lifting his hat in token of farewell, he 
displayed his gray hairs, you stood around with heads 
uncovered, too full of emotion to speak, in solemn 
silence gazing on him as he went on his way to be 
seen of you no more. 

Behold the warrior and statesman, his work well 
done, retired to the Hermitage, to hold converse with 
his forests, to cultivate his farm, to gather around him 
hospitably his friends ! Wlio was like him ? He was 
the load-star of the American people. His fervid 
thoughts, frankly uttered, still spread the flame of 
patriotism tlmough the American breast; his counsels 
were still listened to with reverence; and, almost alone 
among statesmen, he in his retirement was in harmony 
with every onward movement of his time. His pre¬ 
vailing influence assisted to sway a neighboring nation 
to desire to share our institutions; his ear heard the 
footsteps of the coming millions that are to gladden 


476 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


our western shores; and his eye discerned in the dim 
distance the whitening sails that are to enliven the 
Pacific with the social sounds of our commerce. 

Age had whitened his locks, and dimmed his eye, 
and spread round him the infirmities and venerable 
emblems of many years of toilsome service; but his 
heart beat warmly as in his youth, and his courage 
was firm as it had ever been in the day of battle. 
His affections were still for his friends and his coun¬ 
try, his thoughts were akeady in a better world. He 
who in active life had always had unity of perception 
and will, in action had never faltered from doubt, and 
in council had always reverted to first principles and 
general laws, now gave himself to communing with 
the Infinite. He was a behever; from feeling, from 
experience, from conviction. Not a shadow of skepti¬ 
cism ever dimmed the lustre of his mind. Proud 
philosopher! will you smile to know that Andrew 
Jackson perused reverently his Psalter and Prayer- 
book and Bible? Know that he had faith in the 
eternity of truth, in the imperishable power of freedom, 
in the destinies of humanity, in the virtues and ca¬ 
pacity of the people, in his country’s institutions, in 
the being and overruhng providence of a merciful and 
ever-living God. 

The last moment of his life on earth is at hand. 
It is the Sabbath of the Lord; the brightness and 
beauty of summer clothe the fields around him; na- 


COMMEMORATION OF ANDREW JACKSON. 477 

ture is in her glory; but the subhmest spectacle on 
that day, was the victory of his imblenching spirit over 
death itself. 

When he first felt the hand of death upon him, 
“ May my enemies,^’ he cried, “ find peace; may the 
liberties of my country endure for ever.” 

When his exhausted system, under the excess of 
pain, sunk, for a moment, from debihty, “Do not 
weep,” said he to his adopted daughter; “ my suffer¬ 
ings are less than those of Christ upon the cross; ” for 
he, too, as a disciple of the cross, could have devoted 
himself, in sorrow, for mankind. Feeling his end 
near, he would see all his family once more; and he 
spoke to them, one by one, in words of tenderness and 
affection. His two little grandchildren were absent at 
Sunday-school. He asked for them; and as they 
came, he prayed for them, and kissed them, and 
blessed them. His servants were then suromoned; 
they gathered, some in his room, and some on the out¬ 
side of the house, clinging to the windows, that they 
might gaze and hear. And that dying man, thus 
surrounded, in a gush of fervid eloquence, spoke with 
inspiration of God, of the Redeemer, of salvation 
through the atonement, of immortahty, of heaven. 
For he ever thought that pure and undefiled rehgion 
was the foundation of private happiness, and the bul¬ 
wark of republican institutions. “Dear children,” 
such were his final words, “dear children, servants. 


478 


OCCASIONAL ADDEESSES. 


and friends, I trust to meet you all in heaven, both 
white and black—all, both white and black/' And 
having borne his testimony to immortality, he bowed 
his mighty head, and, without a groan, the spirit of the 
greatest man of his age escaped to the bosom of 
his God. 

In life, his career had been like the blaze of the 
sun in the fierceness of its noonday glory; his death 
was lovely as the summer’s evening, when the sun goes 
down in tranquil beauty without a cloud. To the 
majestic energy of an indomitable will, he joined a 
heart capable of the purest and most devoted love, 
rich in the tenderest affections. On the bloody battle 
field of Topoheca, he saved an infant that clung to 
the breast of its dying mother; in the stormiest 
season of his presidency, he paused at the imminent 
moment of decision, to counsel a poor suppliant 
that had come up to him for rehef. Of the strifes 
in which he was engaged in his earlier life, not 
one sprung from himself, but in every case he 
became involved by standing forth as the champi¬ 
on of the weak, the poor, and the defenceless, to 
shelter the gentle against oppression, to protect the 
emigrant against the avarice of the speculator. His 
generous soul revolted at the barbarous practice of 
duels, and by no man in the land have so many been 
prevented. 

The sorrows of those that were near to him went 


COMMEMORATION OP ANDREW JACKSON. 479 


deeply into his soul; and at the anguish of the wife 
whom he loved, the orphans whom he adopted, he 
would melt into tears, and weep and sob like a child. 
No man in private life so possessed the hearts of all 
around him; no public man of this century ever re¬ 
turned to private life with such an abiding mastery 
over the affections of the people. No man with truer 
instinct received American ideas; no man expressed 
them so completely, or so boldly, or so sincerely. He 
was as sincere a man as ever lived. He was wholly, 
always, and altogether sincere and true. 

Up to the last, he dared do any thing that it was 
right to do. He united personal courage and moral 
courage beyond any man of whom history keeps the 
record. Before the nation, before the world, before 
coming ages, he stands forth the representative, for his 
generation, of the American mind. And the secret of 
his greatness is this: by intuitive conception, he shared 
and possessed all the creative ideas of his country 
and his time; he expressed them with dauntless in¬ 
trepidity ; he enforced them with an immovable 
will; he executed them with an electric power that 
attracted and swayed the American people. The 
nation, in his time, had not one great thought, of 
which he was not the boldest and clearest expositor. 

Not danger, not an army in battle array, not 
wounds, not wide-spread clamor, not age, not the 
anguish of disease, could impair in the least degree 


480 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES, 


the vigor of his steadfast mind. The heroes of an¬ 
tiquity would have contemplated with awe the un¬ 
matched hardihood of his character; and Napo¬ 
leon, had he possessed his disinterested will, could 
never have been vanquished. Jackson never was van¬ 
quished. He was always fortunate. He conquered 
the wilderness; he conquered the savage; he con¬ 
quered the bravest veterans trained in the battle fields 
of Europe; he conquered every where in statesman¬ 
ship ; and, when death came to get the mastery over 
him, he turned that last enemy aside as tranquilly as 
he had done the feeblest of his adversaries, and passed 
from earth in the triumphant consciousness of im¬ 
mortality. 

His body has its fit resting-place in the great 
central valley of the Mississippi; his spirit rests upon 
our whole territory; it hovers over the vales of Oregon, 
and guards, in advance, the frontier of the Del Norte. 
The fires of party strife are quenched at his grave. 
His faults and frailties have perished. AVliatever of 
good he has done, lives, and ^vill live for ever. 


ORATION 


DELIVERED BEFORE THE NEW YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY, AT ITS 
SEMI-CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION, NOVEMBER 20, 1851 ^ 

Brothers, Guests, and Friends of the New York 
Historical Society : 

We are assembled to celebrate the completion of a 
half century, unequalled in its discoveries and its deeds. 
Man is but the creature of yesterday, and fifty years 
form a great length in the chain of his entire existence. 
Inferior objects attract the inquirer who would go back 
to remotest antiquity. The student of the chronology 
of the earth may sit on the bluffs that overhang the 
Mississippi, and muse on the myriads of years during 
which the powers of nature have been depositing the 
materials of its delta. He may then, by the aid of in¬ 
duction, draw nearer to the beginnings of time, as he 
meditates on the succession of ages that assisted to 
construct the cliffs which raise their bastions over the 
stream; or to bury in compact layers the fem-like 
forests that have stored the bosom of the great valley 
with coal; or to crystallize the ancient limestojie into 
31 


482 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


marble; or, at a still earlier epoch, to compress liquid 
masses of the globe into seams of granite. But the 
records of these transitions gain their chief interest 
from their illustrating the revolutions through which 
our planet was fashioned into a residence for man. 
Science may roam into the abysses of the past, when 
the earth moved silently in its course without ob¬ 
servers ; just as it may reach those far-off regions of 
nebular fields of light, whose distance no numbers that 
the human faculties may grasp can intelligibly express. 
But as the sublime dwells not in space, so it dwells not 
in duration. To search for it aright, we must contem¬ 
plate the higher subject of man. It is but a few cen¬ 
turies since he came into life; and yet the study of his 
nature and his destiny surpasses all else that can en¬ 
gage his thoughts. At the close of a period which has 
given new proof that unceasing movement is the law 
of whatever is finite, we are called upon to observe the 
general character of the changes in his state. Our 
minds irresistibly turn to consider the laws, the cir¬ 
cumstances and the prospects of his career; we are led 
to inquire whether his faculties and his relations to the 
universe compel him to a steady course of improve¬ 
ment ; whether, in the aggregate, he has actually made 
advances; and what hopes we may cheiish respecting 
his future. The occasion invites me to speak to you 
of the NECESSITY, the reality, and the promise of the 
progress of mankind. 


THE PROGRESS . OF MANKIND. 


483 


Since every thing that is limited suffers perpetual 
alteration, the condition of our race is one of growth 
or of decay. It is the glory of man that he is conscious 
of this law of his existence. lie alone is gifted with 
reason which looks upward as well as before and after, 
and connects him with the world that is not discerned 
by the senses. He alone has the faculty so to combine 
thought with affection, that he can lift up his heart 
and feel not for himself only, but for his brethren and 
his kind. Every man is in substance equal to his 
feUow-man. His nature is changed neither by time 
nor by country. He bears no marks of having risen 
to his present degree of perfection by successive trans¬ 
mutations from inferior forms; but by the pecuharity 
and superiority of his powers he shows himself to have 
been created separate and distinct from all other classes 
of animal life. He is neither degenerating into such 
differences as could in the end no longer be classified 
together, nor rising into a higher species. Each mem¬ 
ber of the race is in udll, affection, and intellect, con- 
substantial with every other; no passion, no noble or 
degrading affection, no generous or selfish impulse, has 
ever appeared, of which the genn does not exist in 
eveiy breast. No science has been reached, no thought 
generated, no truth discovered, which has not from all 
time existed potentially in every human mind. The 
belief in the progress of the race does not, therefore, 
spring from the supposed possibility of his acquiring 


484 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


new faculties, or coming into the possession of a new 
nature. 

Still less does truth vary. They speak falsely who 
say that truth is the daughter of time; it is the child 
of eternity, and as old as the Divine mind. The per¬ 
ception of it takes place in the order of time; truth 
itself knows nothing of the succession of ages. Neither 
does morality need to perfect itself; it is what it 
always has been, and always will be. Its distinctions 
are older than the sea or the dry land, than the earth or 
the sun. The relation of good to evil is from the 
beginning, and is unalterable. 

The progress of man consists in this, that he 
himself arrives at the perception of truth. The Divine 
mind, which is its source, left it to be discovered, 
appropriated and developed by finite creatures. 

The life of an individual is but a breath; it comes 
forth like a flower, and flees like a shadow. Were no 
other progress, therefore, possible than that of the in¬ 
dividual, one period would have little advantage over 
another. But as every man partakes of the same 
faculties and is consubstantial with all, it follows that 
the race also has an existence of its own; and this 
existence becomes richer, more varied, free and com¬ 
plete, as time advances. Common sense implies by its 
very name, that each individual is to contribute some 
share toward the general intelligence. The many are 
wiser than the few; the multitude than the philos- 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


485 


opher; the race than the individual; and each suc¬ 
cessive generation than its predecessor. 

The social condition of a century, its faith and its 
institutions, are always analogous to its acquisitions. 
Neither philosophy, nor government, nor political insti¬ 
tutions, nor religious knowledge, can remain much 
behind, or go much in advance, of the totality of con¬ 
temporary intelligence. The age furnishes to the 
master-workman the materials with which he builds. 
The outbreak of a revolution is the pulsation of the 
time, healthful or spasmodic, according to its harmony 
with the civilization from which it springs. Each new 
philosophical system is the heliograph of an evanescent 
condition of public thought. The state in which we 
are, is man's natural state at this moment; but it 
neither should be nor can be his permanent state, for 
his existence is flowing on in eternal motion, with 
nothing fixed but the certainty of change. Now, by 
the necessity of the case, the movement of the human 
mind, taken collectively, is always toward something 
better. There exists in each individual, alongside of 
his own personality, the ideal man who represents the 
race. Every one bears about within himself the con¬ 
sciousness that his course is a struggle; and per¬ 
petually feels the contrast between his owm limited 
nature and the better life of which he conceives. He 
cannot state a proposition respecting a finite object, 
but it includes also a reference to the infinite. He 


486 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


cannot form a judgment, but it combines ideal truth 
and partiareiTor, and, as a consequence, sets in action 
the antagonism between the true and the perfect on 
the one side, and the false and the imperfect on the 
other; and in this contest the true and the perfect 
must prevail, for they have the advantage of being 
perennial. 

In public hfe, by the side of the actual state of the 
world, there exists the ideal state toward which it 
should tend. This antagonism lies at the root of all 
political combinations that ever have been or ever can 
be formed. The elements on which they rest, whether 
in monarchies, aristocracies, or in republics, are but 
three, not one of which can be wanting, or society falls 
to ruin. The course of human destiny is ever a rope 
of three strands. One party may found itself on things 
as they are, and strive for their unaltered perpetuity; 
this is conservatism, always appearing wherever estab¬ 
lished interests exist, and never capable of unmingled 
success, because finite things are ceaselessly in motion. 
Another may be based on theoretic principles, and 
struggle unrelentingly to conform society to the abso¬ 
lute law of Truth and Justice; and this, though it 
kindle the purest enthusiasm, can likemse never per¬ 
fectly succeed, because the materials of which society is 
composed partake of imperfection, and to extirpate all 
that is imperfect would lead to the destruction of 
society itself. And there may be a third, which 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


487 


seeks to reconcile the two, but which yet can never 
thrive by itself, since it depends for its activity on 
the clashing between the fact and the higher law. 
Without all the three, the fates could not spin their 
thread. As the motions of the solar world require the 
centripetal force, which, by itself alone, would con¬ 
solidate all things in one massive confusion; the centri¬ 
fugal force, which, if uncontrolled, would hurl the 
planets on a tangent into infinite space; and lastly, 
that reconciling adjustment, which preserves the two 
powers in harmony; so society always has within itself 
the elements of conservatism, of absolute right, and 
of reform. 

The present state of the world is accepted by the 
wise and benevolent as the necessary and natural result 
of all its antecedents. But the statesman, whose heart 
has been purified by the love of his kind, and whose 
purpose solemnized by faith in the immutability of 
justice, seeks to apply every principle which former 
ages or his own may have mastered, and to make 
every advancement that the culture of his time will 
sustain. In a word, he will never omit an opportunity 
to hft his country out of the inferior sphere of its 
actual condition into the higher and better sphere 
that is nearer to ideal perfection. 

The merits of great men are to be tested by this 
criterion. I speak of the judgment of the race, not 
of the opinion of classes. The latter exalt, and even 


488 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


deify the advocates of their selfishness; and often pro¬ 
portion their praise to the daring, with which right and 
truth have been made to succumb to their interests. 

^ They lavish laurels all the more profusely to hide the 
baldness of their heroes. But reputation so imparted 
is like every thing else that rests only on the finite. V 
Vain is the applause of factions, or the suffrages of 
those whose fortunes are benefited; fame so attained, 
must pass away like the interests of classes; but the 
name of those who have studied the well-being of their 
fellow-men, and in their generation have assisted to 
raise the world from the actual toward the ideal, is 
repeated in all the temples of humanity, and lives not 
only in its intelligence, but in its heart. These are 
they, whose glory calumny cannot tarnish, nor pride 
beat down. Connecting themselves with man’s ad¬ 
vancement, their example never loses its lustre; and 
the echo of their footsteps is heard throughout all time 
with sympathy and love. 

The necessity of the progress of the race follows, 
therefore, from the fact, that the great Author of all 
life has left truth in its immutability to be observed, 
and has endowed man with the power of observation 
and generalization. Precisely the same conclusions 
will appear, if we contemplate society from the point 
of view of the unity of the universe. The unchanging 
character of law is the only basis on which continuous 
action can rest. Without it man would be but as the 




THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


489 


traveller over endless morasses; the builder on quick¬ 
sands ; the mariner without compass or rudder, driven 
successively whithersoever changing winds may blow. 
The universe is the reflex and image of its Creator. 
“ The true work of art,” says Michael Angelo, “ is but 
a shadow of the Divine perfections.” We may say in 
a more general manner, that beauty itself is but the 
SENSIBLE IMAGE OF THE INFINITE ; that all creation is 
a manifestation of the Almighty; not the result of 
caprice, but the glorious display of his perfection; and 
as the universe thus produced, is always in the course 
of change, so its regulating mind is a living Providence, 
perpetually exerting itself anew. If his designs could 
be thwarted, we should lose the great evidence of his 
unity, as well as the anchor of our own hope. 

Harmony is the characteristic of the intellectual 
system of the universe; and immutable laws of moral 
existence must pervade all time and all space, all ages 
and all worlds. The comparative anatomist has stu¬ 
died, analysed and classified every species of vertebrate 
existence that now walks, or flies, or creeps, or swims, 
or reposes among the fossil remains of lost forms of 
being; and he discovers that they all, without excep¬ 
tion, are analogous; so that the induction becomes 
irresistible, that an archetype existed previous to the 
creation of the first of the kind. Shall we then hesitate 
to believe that the fixedness of law likewise pervades 
the moral world? We cannot shut our eyes to the es- 


490 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


tablished fact, that an ideal, or archetype, prescribed 
the form of animal life; and shall we not believe that 
the type of all intellectual life likewise exists in the 
Divine mind ? 

I know that there is a pride which calls this fatal¬ 
ism, and which rebels at the thought that the Father 
of life should control what he has made. There are 
those who must needs assert for their individual selves 
the constant possession of that power which the great 
English poet represents the bad angels to have lost 
heaven for once attempting to usurp; they are not 
content with being gifted Avith the faculty of discerning 
the counsels of God, and becoming happy by' conform¬ 
ing to his decrees, but claim the privilege of acting 
irrespective of those decrees. Unsatisfied with having 
been created in his image, they assume the liberty to 
counteract his will. They do not perceive that cos- 
mical order depends on the universality and absolute 
certainty of laAV; that for that end, events in their 
course are not merely as fixed as Ararat and the 
Andes, but follow laws that are much older than 
Andes or Ararat, that are as old as those Avhich up- 
heaved the mountains. The glory of God is not con¬ 
tingent on man’s good will, but all existence subserves 
his purposes. The system of the universe is as a 
/ celestial poem, whose beauty is from all eternity, and 
must not be marred by human interpolations. Things 
proceed as they Avere ordered, in their nice, and Avell- 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


491 


adjusted, and perfect harmony; so that as the hand of 
the skilful artist gathers music from the harp-strings, 
iiistory calls it forth from the well-tuned chords of time. 
Not that this harmony can be heard during the tumult 
of action. Philosophy comes after events, and gives 
the reason of them, and describes the nature of their 
results. The great mind of collective man may, one 
day, so improve in self-consciousness as to interpret 
the present and foretell the future; but as yet, the end 
of what is now happening, though we om’selves partake 
in it, seems to fall out by chance. All is nevertheless 
one whole; individuals, families, peoples, the race, 
march in accord with the Divine will; and when any 
part of the destiny of humanity is fulfilled, we see the 
ways of Providence vindicated. The antagonisms of 
imperfect matter and the perfect idea, of liberty and 
necessary law, become reconciled. What seemed 
irrational confusion, appears as the web woven by 
light, liberty and love. But this is not perceived till 
a great act in the drama of life is finished. The 
prayer of the patriarch, when he desired to behold the 
Divinity face to face, was denied; but he was able to 
catch a glimpse of Jehovah, after He had passed by; 
and so it fares with our search for Him in the wrest¬ 
lings of the ^vorld.It is when the hour of conflict is 
over, that history comes to a right understanding of 
the strife, and is ready to exclaim: Lo! God is 
here, and we knew it not.^ At the foot of every page 


492 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


in the annals of nations, maybe written, ‘‘ God reigns.” 
Events, as they pass away, ‘‘proclaim their Great 
Original; ” and if you will but listen reverently, you 
may hear the receding centuries as they roll into the 
dim distances of departed time, perpetually chanting 
“ Te Deum Laudamus,” with all the choral voices of 
the countless congregations of the ages. 

It is because God is visible in History that its 
office is the noblest except that of the poet. The poet 
is at once the interpreter and the favorite of Heaven. 
He catches the first beam of light that flows from its 
uncreated source. He repeats the message of the 
Infinite, without always being able to analyze it, and 
often without knowing how he received it, or why he 
was selected for its utterance. To him and to him 
alone, history yields in dignity; for she not only watches 
the great encounters of life, but recalls what had van¬ 
ished, and partaking of a bliss like that of creating, 
restores it to animated being. The mineralogist takes 
special delight in contemplating the process of crystal¬ 
lization, as though he had caught nature at her work 
as a geometrician; giving herself up to be gazed at 
without concealment such as she appears in the very 
moment of exertion. But history, as she reclines in 
the lap of eternity, sees the mind of humanity itself 
engaged in formative efforts, constructing sciences, 
promulgating laws, organizing commonwealths, and 
displaying its energies in the visible movement of its 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


493 


intelligence. Of all pursuits that require analysis, 
history, therefore, stands first. It is equal to philoso¬ 
phy ; for as certainly as the actual bodies forth the 
ideal, so certainly does history contain philosophy. It 
is grander than the natural sciences; for its study is 
man, the last work of creation, and the most perfect in 
its relations with the Infinite. 

In surveying the short period since man was 
created, the proofs of progress are so abundant, that 
we do not know with which of them to begin, or how 
they should be classified. He is seen in the earliest 
stages of society, bare of abstract truth, unskilled in the 
methods of induction, and hardly emancipated from 
bondage to the material universe. How wonderful is 
it, then, that a being whose first condition was so weak, 
so humble, and so naked, and of whom no monument 
older than forty centuries can be found, should have 
accumulated such fruitful stores of intelligence, and 
have attained such perfection of culture ! 

Look round upon this beautiful earth, this “ tem¬ 
perate zone of the solar system,” and see how much man 
has done for its subjection and adornment; making 
the wilderness blossom with cities, and the seemingly 
inhospitable sea cheerfully social with the richly 
freighted fleets of world-wide commerce. Look also 
at the condition of society, and consider by what 
amenities barbarism has been softened and refined, 
what guarantees of intelligence and liberty have su- 


494 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


perseded the lawlessness of brute force, and what 
copious interchanges of thought and love have taken 
the place of the sombre stolidity of the savage. The 
wanderings of the nations are greater now than ever in 
time past, and productive of happier results. Peaceful 
emigration sets more myriads in motion than all the 
hordes of armed barbarians, whether Gauls or Scyth¬ 
ians, Goths or Huns, Scandinavians or Saracens, that 
ever burst from the steppes of Asia and the Northern 
nurseries of men. Our own city gives evidence that 
the civilized world is becoming one federation; for its 
storehouses exhibit all products, from furs that are 
whitened by Arctic snows, to spices ripened under the 
burning sun of the equator; and its people is the 
representative of all the cultivated nations of Europe. 

Every clime is tasked also to enlarge the boundaries 
of knowledge. Minerals that lie on the peaks of the 
Himalayas, animals that hide in the densest jungles 
of Africa, flowers that bloom in the solitudes of Su¬ 
matra, or the trackless swamps along the Amazon, are 
brought within the observation and domain of science. 

With equal diligence the internal structure of plants 
and animals has been subjected to examination. We 
may gaze with astonishment at the advances which the 
past fifty years have made in the science of comparative 
physiology. By a most laborious and long-continued 
use of the microscope, and by a vast number of careful 
and minute dissections, man has gained such insight 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


495 


into animal being, as not only to define its primary 
groups, but almost to draAV tlie ideal archetype that 
preceded their creation. Not content with the study 
of his own organization and the comparison of it with 
the Fauna of every zone, he has been able to count 
the pulsations of the heart of a caterpillar; to watch 
the flow of blood through the veins of the silkworm; 
to enumerate the millions of living things that dwell in 
a drop of water; to take the census of creatures so 
small, that parts of their members remain invisible to 
the most powerful microscope; to trace the lungs of 
the insect which floats so gayly on the limber fans 
of its wings, and revels in the full fruition of its tran¬ 
scendent powers of motion. 

The astronomer, too, has so perfected his skill, that 
he has weighed in the balance some, even, of the stars, 
and marked the course and tlie period of their revolu¬ 
tions ; while, within the limits of our own system, he 
has watched the perturbations of the wandering fires, 
till he has achieved his crowning victory by discovering 
a priori the existence and the place of an exterior 
planet. 

I have reminded you of the few hundreds of years 
during which man has been a tenant of earth, and of 
the great proportion that the last half century bears to 
the whole of his existence. Let us consider this more 
closely; for I dare assert that, in some branches of 
human activity, the period we commemorate has done 


496 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


more for his instruction and improvement than all 
which went before. 

I do not here refer to our own country, because it 
is altogether new, though its growth merits a passing 
remark; for within this time the area of our land has 
been so extended that a similar increase, twice repeated, 
would carry the stars and stripes to the polar ice 
and to the isthmus ; while our population now exceeds 
fivefold all who existed at the end of the two previous 
centuries, and probably outnumbers all the generations 
that sleep beneath the soil. I speak rather of results, 
in which the old world takes its share; and I will 
begin the enumeration by reference to an improvement 
which we may delight to consider our own. Your 
thoughts go in advance of me to recall the fact, that 
since our Society was organized, steam was first em¬ 
ployed for both interior and oceanic navigation. We, 
BROTHERS of the New York Historical Society, 
remember with pride that this great achievement in 
behalf of the connection and the unity of the world, is 
due to the genius of one of our members, and the en- 
com’agement of another; to Robert Fulton and to 
Robert R. Livingston. 

The same superiority belongs to this age in refer¬ 
ence to the construction of the means of internal com¬ 
munication. What are all the artificial channels of 
travel and of commerce that previously existed, com¬ 
pared with the canals and railroads constructed in our 



THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


497 


time ? I shall not pause to estimate the number of 
these newly made highways; their collective length; 
their capacity for joumeyings and for trade : I leave to 
others to contrast the occasional Oriental or African 
caravan with the daily freight-train on one of our iron 
pathways; the post-chaise, the stage-coach, and the 
diligence, with the incessant movement in the canal 
boats and the flying cars of the railroad. Yet in your 
presence, my brothers, remembering the eleven men 
who, fifty years ago, met and organized our society, I 
must for an instant direct attention to the system which 
connects our own Hudson with the basins of the St. 
Lawrence, of the Delaware, of the Susquehanna and 
of the Mississippi. This magnificent work, one of the 
noblest triumphs of civilized man, so friendly to peace 
and industry, to national union and true glory, was 
efiected through the special instrumentality of one of 
our original founders and most active members; the 
same De Witt Clinton, who in days when the city 
of New York was proud of her enlightened magistracy, 
was at the head of her municipal government, esteem¬ 
ing it a part of his public duty to care disinterestedly 
for the w^elfare of science, and the fame of the great 
men of the country. 

The half century which now closes, is likewise 
foimd to surpass all others, if we consider the extent 
of its investigations into the history of the earth. 
Geology, in that time, has assmned a severe scientific 
32 


498 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


form, doing the highest honor, not merely to the indi¬ 
vidual men who have engaged in the pursuit, but to 
human nature itself, by the persevering application of 
inductive reasoning, and the imperturbable serenity with 
which seeming contradictions have been studied till 
they have been found to confirm the general laws. Thus 
the geologist has been able to ascertain, in some 
degree, the chronology of om: planet; to demonstrate 
the regularity of its structure where it seemed most 
disturbed; and where nature herseK was at fault, and 
the trail of her footsteps broken, to restore the just 
arrangement of strata that had been crushed into 
confusion, or turned over in apparently inexplicable 
and incongruous folds. He has perused the rocky 
tablets on which time-honored nature has set her in¬ 
scriptions, He has opened the massive sepulckres of 
departed forms of being, and pored over the copious 
records preserved there in stone, till they have revealed, 
the majestic march of creative power, from the organism 
of the zoophyte entombed in the lowest depths of 
Siluria, through aU the rising gradations of animal life, 
up to its sublimest result in Godlike man. 

Again: It is only in our day that the sun has been 
taught to do the work of an artist, and in obedience to 
man’s will, the great wave of light in its inconceivable 
swiftness, is compelled to delineate, with inimitable 
exactness, any object that the eye of day looks upon. 

Of the nature of electricity, more has been discov- 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


499 


ered in the last fifty years than in all past time, not 
even excepting the age when our oAvn Franklin called 
it from the clouds. This aerial, invisible power, has 
learnt to fly as man’s faithful messenger, till the mystic 
wes tremble with his passions and bear his en’ands 
on the wings of lightning. He divines how this agency, 
which holds the globe in its invisible embrace, guides 
floating atoms to their places in the crystal; or teaches 
the mineral ores the lines in which they should move, 
where to assemble together, and wliere to lie do\Mi and 
take their rest. It whispers to the meteorologist the 
secrets of the atmosphere and the skies. For the 
chemist in his laboratory it perfects the instruments 
of lieat, dissolves the closest affinities, and reunites the 
sundered elements. It joins the artisan at his toil, and 
busily employed at his side, this subtlest and swiftest 
of existences tamely applies itself to its task, ’with 
patient care reproduces the designs of the engraver or 
the plastic art, and disposes the metal with a skilful 
delicacy and exactness which the best workman cannot 
rival. Nay more: it enters into the composition of 
man himself, and is ever present as the inmost witness 
of his thoughts and vohtions. These are discoveries of 
our time. 

But enough of this contrast of the achievement of 
one age with that of all preceding ones. It may seem 
to be at variance with our theme, that as republican 
institutions gain ground, woman appears less on the 


500 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


theatre of events. She, whose presence in this briery 
world is as a lily among thorns, whose smile is pleasant 
like the light of morning, and whose eye is the gate of 
heaven; she, whom nature so reveres, that the lovely 
veil of her spirit is the best terrestrial emblem of 
beauty, must cease to command armies or reign su¬ 
preme over nations. Yet the progress of liberty, 
while it has made her less conspicuous, has redeemed 
her into the possession of the full dignity of her nature, 
has made her not man’s slave, but his companion, his 
counsellor, and fellow-martyr; and, for an occasional 
ascendency in political affairs, has substituted the 
uniform enjoyment of domestic equality. The avenue 
to active public life seems closed against her, but 
without impairing her power over mind, or her fame. • 
The lyre is as obedient to her touch, the muse as 
coming to her call, as to that of man; and truth in its 
purity finds no more honored interpreter. 

When comparisons are drawn between longer pe¬ 
riods, the progress of the race appears from the change 
in the condition of its classes. Time knows no holier 
mission than to assert the rights of labor, and it has, in 
some measure, been mindful of the duty. Were Aris¬ 
totle or Plato to come among us, they would find no 
contrast more complete than between the workshops of 
their Athens, and those of New York. In their day 
the bondmen practised the mechanic arts ; nor was it 
conceived that the world could do its work except by 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


501 


the use of slaves. But labor deserves and has the 
right to be dignified and ennobled, and the auspicious 
revolution in its condition has begun. Here the me¬ 
chanic, at the shipyard, or the iron-works, or wherever 
may be the task of his choice, owns no master on 
earth; and while, by the careful study and employment 
of the forces of nature, he multipHes his powers, he 
sweetens his daily toil by the consciousness of personal 
independence, and the enjoyment of his acknowledged 
claim to honor no less than to reward. 

The fifty years which we celebrate, have taken 
mighty strides toward the abohtion of servitude. Prus¬ 
sia, in the hour of its sufferings and its greatest calami¬ 
ties, renovated its existence partly by the estabhshment 
of schools, and partly by changing its serfs into a pro¬ 
prietary peasantry. In Hungary, the attempt toward 
preserving the nationality of the Magyars may have 
failed; but the last vestiges of bondage have been 
effaced, and the holders of the plough have become the 
owners of themselves and of its soil. 

If events do, as I beheve, correspond to the Divine 
idea; if God is the fountain of all goodness, the in- ) 
spirer of true affection, the source of all inteUigence; 
there is nothing of so great moment to the race as the 
conception of his existence; and a true apprehension 
of his relations to man must constitute the turning 
point in the progress of the world. And it has been 
so. A better knowledge of his nature is the dividing 


502 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


line that separates ancient history from modem; the 
old time from the new. The thought of Divine unity 
as an absolute cause was familiar to antiquity; but the 
undivided testimony of the records of all cultivated 
nations shows that it took no hold of the popular 
affections. Philosophers might conceive this Divine 
unity as pm*est action, unmixed with matter; as fate, 
holding the universe in its invincible, unrelenting 
grasp; as, reason, going forth to the work of creation; 
as the primal somxe of the ideal archetypes, according 
to which the world was fashioned; as boundless power, 
careless of boundless existence; as the infinite one, 
slumbering unconsciously in the infinite all. Nothing 
of this could take hold of the common mind, or make 
‘‘ Peor and Baalim 
Porsake their temples dim,’’ 
or throw down the altars of superstition. 

Por the regeneration of the world, it was requisite 
that the Divine Being should enter into the abodes and 
the hearts of men, and dwell there; that a belief in 
him should be received, which should include all tmth 
respecting his essence; that he should be known not 
only as an abstract and absolute cause, but as the 
infinite fountain of moral excellence and beauty; not as 
a distant Providence of boundless power and uncertain 
or inactive will, but as God present in the flesh; not 
as an absolute lawgiver, holding the material world 
and all intelligent existence in the chains of necessity. 





THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 503 

bill as a creative spirit, indwellmg in man, his fellow- 
worker and guide. 

^Vhen the Divine Being was thus presented to the 
soul, he touched at once man’s aspirations, affections, 
and intelligence, and faith in him sunk into the inmost 
heart of humanity. In vain did restless pride, as that 
of Arius, seek to paganise Christianity and make it 
the ally of imperial despotism; to prefer a beUef resting 
on ‘authority and unsupported by an inward witness, 
over the clear revelation of which the milhons might 
see and feel and know the divine glory ; to substitute 
the conception, framed after the pattern of heathenism, 
of an agent, superhuman yet finite, for faith in the 
ever-continuing union of God with man; to wrong the 
majesty and holiness of the Spirit of God by represent¬ 
ing it as a birth of time. Against these attempts to 
subordinate the enfranchising virtue of truth to false 
worship and to arbitrary power, reason asserted its 
supremacy, and the party of superstition was driven 
from the field. Then mooned Ashtaroth was eclipsed, 
and Osiris w^as seen no more in Memphian grove; then 
might have been heard the crash of the falling temples 
of Polytheism; and, instead of them, came that har¬ 
mony which holds Heaven and Earth in happiest union. 

Amid the deep sorrows of humanity during the sad 
conflict which was protracted through centuries for the 
overthrow of the past and the reconstmetion of society, 
the consciousness of an incarnate God carried peace 


504 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


into the bosom of mankind. That faith emancipated 
the slave, broke the bondage of woman, redeemed the 
captive, elevated the low, lifted up the oppressed, con¬ 
soled the wretched, inspired alike the heroes of thought 
and the countless masses. The down-trodden nations 
clung to it as to the certainty of their future emanci¬ 
pation ; and it so filled the heart of the greatest poet 
of the Middle Ages—^perhaps the greatest poet of all 
time—^that he had no prayer so earnest as to behold in 
the profound and clear substance of the eternal light, 
that circling of refiected glory which showed the image 
of man. 

From the time that this truth of the triune God 
was clearly announced, he was no longer dimly con¬ 
ceived as a remote and shadowy causality, but appeared 
as all that is good and beautiful and true; as goodness 
itself, incarnate and interceding, redeeming and in¬ 
spiring ; the union of liberty, love, and light; the in¬ 
finite cause, the infinite mediator, the infinite in and 
-with the universe, as the paraclete and comforter. The 
doctrine once communicated to man, was not to be 
eradicated. It spread as widely, as swiftly, and as 
silently as light, and the idea of God with us dwelt 
and dwells in every system of thought that can pretend 
to vitality; in every oppressed people, whose struggles 
to be free have the promise of success; in every soul 
that sighs for redemption. 




THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


505 


This brings me to the last division of my subject. 
That God has dwelt and dwells with humanity is not 
only the noblest illustration of its nature, but the per¬ 
fect guarantee for its progress. We are entering on a 
new era in the history of the race, and though we can¬ 
not cast its horoscope, we at least may in some meas¬ 
ure discern the course of its motion. 

Here we are met at the very threshold of our argu¬ 
ment by an afterbirth of the materialism of the last 
century. A system which professes to re-construct 
society on the simple observation of the laws of the 
visible universe, and which is presented with arrogant 
pretension under the name of the “Positive Philos¬ 
ophy,” scoffs at all questions of metaphysics and reli¬ 
gious faith as insoluble and unworthy of human atten¬ 
tion ; and affects to raise the banner of an affirming 
belief in the very moment that it describes its main 
characteristic as a refusal to recognise the infinite. 
How those who o^vn no source of knowledge but 
the senses, can escape its humihating yoke, I leave them 
to discover. But it is as httle entitled to be feared as 
to be received. When it has put together all that it 
can collect of the laws of the material universe, it can 
advance no further toward the explanation of existence, 
morals, or reason. 

Philosophy which leaned on Heaven before, ' 

Shrinks to her second cause, and is no more. 

They who listen to the instructions of inward expe- 


506 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


rience, may smile at the air of wisdom with which a 
scheme that has no basis in the soul is presented to the 
world as a new universal creed, the Catholic Chm^ch 
of the materialist. Its handful of acolytes wonder why 
they remain so few. But Atheism never holds sway 
over human thought except as a usm’per; no child of 
its own succeeding. Error is a convertible term with 
decay. Falsehood and death are synonyms. False¬ 
hood can gain no permanent foothold in the immortal 
soul; for there can be no abiding or real faith, except 
in that which is eternally and universally true. The 
future will never produce a race of atheists, and their 
casual appearance is but the evidence of some ill-under- 
stood truth; some mistaken direction of the human 
mind; some perverse or imperfect view of creation. 
The atheist denies the life of life, which is the source 
of liberty. Proclaiming himself a mere finite thing 
of to-day, he rejects all connection with the infinite. 
Pretending to search for truth, he abjures the spirit of 
truth. Were it possible that the world of mankind 
could become without God, that greatest death, the 
death of the race would ensue. It is because man 
cannot separate himself from his inward experience 
and his yearning after the infinite, that he is capable 
of progress; that he can receive a religion whose his¬ 
tory is the triumph of right over evil, whose symbol is 
the resurrection. 

The reciprocal relation between God and humanity 


THE PROGRESS OP MANKIND. 507 

constitutes the unity of the race. The more complete 
recognition of that unity is the first great promise 
which we receive from the future. Nations have, 
indeed, had their separate creeds and institutions and 
homes. The commonwealth of mankind, as a great 
whole, was not to be constructed in one generation. 
But the different peoples are to be considered as its 
component parts, prepared, like so many springs and 
wheels, one day to be put together. 

Every thing tends to that consummation. Geo¬ 
graphical research has penetrated nearly every part 
of the world, revealed the paths of the ocean, and 
chronicled even the varying courses of the winds; 
while commerce circles the globe. At our Antipodes, 
a new continent, lately tenanted only by the wildest of 
men and the strangest products of nature, the kangaroo 
and the quadruped with the bill of a bird, becomes an 
outpost of civilization, one day to do service in regen¬ 
erating the world. 

In this great work our country holds the noblest 
rank. Rome subdued the regions round the Mediter¬ 
ranean and the Euxine, both inland seas; the German 
Empire spread from the German Ocean to the Adriatic. 
Our land extends far into the wilderness, and beyond 
the wilderness; and while on this side the great moun¬ 
tains it gives the Western nations of Europe a theatre 
for the renewal of their youth, on the transmontane 
side, the hoary civilisation of the farthest antiquity 


4 


508 OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 

leans forward from Asia to receive the glad tidings 
of the messenger of freedom. The islands of the 
Pacific entreat our protection, and at our suit the 
Empire of Japan breaks down its wall of exclusion. 

Our land is not more the recipient of the men of 
all countries than of their ideas. Annihilate the past 
of any one leading nation of the world, and our destiny 
would have been changed. Italy and Spain, in the per¬ 
sons of Columbus and Isabella, joined together for 
the great discovery that opened America to emigration 
and commerce; Prance contributed to its independence; 
the search for the origin of the language we speak car¬ 
ries us to India; our religion is from Palestine; of the 
hymns sung in our churches, some were first heard in 
Italy, some in the deserts of Arabia, some on the banks 
of the Euphrates ; our arts come from Greece; our 
jurisprudence from Pome; our maritime code from 
Russia; England taught us the system of Represen¬ 
tative Government; the noble Repubhc of the United 
Provinces bequeathed to us, in the world of thought, 
the great idea of the toleration of all opinions; in the 
world of action, the prohfic principle of federal union. 
Our country -stands, therefore, more than any other, as 
the reahsation of the unity of the race. 

There is one institution so wide in its infiuence and 
its connections, that it may already be said to repre¬ 
sent the intelligence of universal man. I have reserved 
to this place a reference to the power, which has 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


509 


obtained its majestic development within the last fifty 
years, till it now forms the controUing agency in reno¬ 
vating civihsation; surpassing in the extent and effect¬ 
iveness of its teachings the lessons of the Academy and 
of the pulpit. The invisible force of the magnetic ether 
does not more certainly extend throughout the air and 
the earth, than the press gives an impulse to the wave 
of thought, so that it vibrates round the globe. The 
diversity of nationalities and of governments continues; 
the press illustrates the unity of our intellectual world, 
and constitutes itself the organ of collective humanity. 

By the side of the press, the system of free schools, 
though still very imperfectly developed, has made such 
progress since it first dawned in Geneva and in parishes 
of Scotland, that we claim it of the future as a univer¬ 
sal institution. 

The moment we enter upon an enlarged consider¬ 
ation of existence, we may as well believe in beings 
that are higher than ourselves, as in those that are 
lower; nor is it absurd to inquire whether there is a 
plurality of wnrlds. Induction warrants the opinion, 
that the planets and the stars are tenanted, or are to be 
tenanted, by inhabitants endowed with reason; for 
though man is but a new comer upon earth, the lower 
animals had appeared through unnumbered ages, like 
a long twilight before the day. Some indeed tremu¬ 
lously inquire, how it may be in those distant spheres 
with regard to redemption ? But the scruple is un- 


510 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


called for. Since the Mediator is from the beginning, 
he exists for aU intelligent creatures not less than for 
all time. It is very narrow and contradictory to con¬ 
fine his oifice to the planet on which we dwell. In 
other worlds the facts of history may be, or rather, by 
all the laws of induction, ^vill be different; but the 
essential relations of the finite to the infinite are, and 
must be invariable. It is not more certain that the 
power of gravity extends through the visible universe, 
than that throughout all time and aU space, there is 
but one mediation between God and created reason. 

But leaving aside the question, how far rational life 
extends, it is certain that on earth the capacity of 
coming into connection with the infinite is the distin¬ 
guishing mark of our kind, and proves it to be one. 
Here, too, is our solace for the indisputable fact, that 
humanity in its upward course passes through the 
shadows of death, and over the rehcs of decay. Its 
march is strown with the ruins of formative efforts, 
that were never crowned with success. How often 
does the just man suffer, and sometimes suffer most for 
his brightest virtues ! How often do noblest sacrifices 
to regenerate a nation seem to have been offered in 
C" vain! How often is the champion of liberty struck 
y down in the battle, and the symbol which he uplifted, 
trampled underfoot! But what is the life of an indi¬ 
vidual to that of his country ? of a state, or a nation, 
at a given moment, to that of the race ? The just man 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


511 


would cease to be just, if he were not willing to perish 
* for his kind. The scoria that fly from the iron at the 
stroke of the artisan, show how busily he plies his task; 
the clay which is rejected from the potter’s wheel, 
proves the progress of his work; the chips of marble 
that are thrown off by the chisel of the sculptor, leave 
the miracle of beauty to grow imder his hand. No¬ 
thing is lost. I leave to others the questioning of 
Infinite power, why the parts are distributed as they 
are, and not otherwise. Humanity moves on, attended 
liy its glorious company of martyrs. It is our conso¬ 
lation, that their sorrows and persecution and death 
are encountered in the common cause, and not in vain. 

The world is just beginning to take to heart this 
principle of the unity of the race, and to discover how 
fully and how beneficently it is fraught with inter¬ 
national, political, and social revolutioris. Without 
attempting to unfold what the greater wisdom of 
coming generations can alone adequately conceive and 
practically apply, we may observe, that the human 
mind tends not only toward unity, but universality. 

Infinite truth is never received without some ad¬ 
mixture of error, and in the struggle which necessarily 
ensues between the two, the error constantly undergoes 
the process of elimination. Investigations are con¬ 
tinued Avithout a pause. .The explanatory hypothesis, 
perpetually renewed, receives perpetual connection. 
Fresh observations detect the fallacies in the former 


512 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


hypothesis; again, mind, acting a priori, revises its 
theory, of which it repeats and multiplies the tests. 
Thus it proceeds from observation to hypothesis, and 
from hypothesis to observation, progressively gaining 
clearer perceptions, and more perfectly mastering its 
stores of accumulated knowledge by generahsations 
Avhich approximate nearer and nearer to absolute truth. 

With each successive year, a larger number of 
minds in each separate nationality inquires into man’s 
end and nature; and as truth and the laws of God are 
unchangeable, the more that engage in their study, the 
greater will be the harvest. Nor is this all; the 
nations are drawn to each other as members of one 
family; and their mutual acquisitions become a com¬ 
mon property. 

In this manner, truth, as discerned by the mind of 
man, is constantly recovering its primal lustre, and is 
steadily making its way toward general acceptance. 
Not that greater men will appear. Who can ever 
embody the high creative imagination of the poet more 
perfectly than Homer, or Dante, or Shakespeare? 
Who can discern “the ideas” of existences more 
clearly than Plato, or be furnished with all the 
. instruments of thought and scientific attainment more 
completely than Aristotle ? To what future artist 
will beauty be more intimately present, than to Phidias 
or Raphaei. ? In universality of mind, who will sur¬ 
pass Bacon, or Leibnitz, or Kant? Indeed, the 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


513 


world may never again see their peers. There are not 
wanting those who believe, that the more intelligence is 
diffused, the less will the intelligent be distinguished 
from one another; that the colossal greatness of indi¬ 
viduals imphes a general inferiority; just as the solitar}' 
tree on the plain alone reaches the fullest development; 
or as the rock that stands by itself in the wilderness, 
seems to cast the widest and most grateful shade; in a 
word, that the day of mediocrity attends the day of 
general culture. But if ^viser men do not arise, there 
will certainly be more wisdom. The collective man 
of the future will see further, and see more clearly, 
than the collective man of to-day, and he will share his 
superior power of vision and his attainments with every 
one of his time. Thus it has come to pass, that the 
child now at school could instruct Columbus respecting 
the figure of the earth, or Newton respecting light, or 
Franklin on electricity; that the husbandman or the 
mechanic of a Christian congregation solves questions 
respecting God and man and man’s destiny, which 
perplexed the most gifted philosophers of ancient 
Greece. 

Finally, as a consequence of the tendency of the 
race towards unity and universality, the organization 
of society must more and more conform to the princi¬ 
ple of freedom. This ^vill be the last triumph; partly 
because the science of government enters into the 
sphere of personal interests, and meets resistance from 
33 


514 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


private selfishness; and partly because society, before 
it can be constituted aright, must turn its eye upon 
itself, observe the laws of its own existence, and arrive 
at the consciousness of its capacities and relations. 

The system of political economy may solve the 
question of the commercial intercourse of nations, by 
demonstrating that they all are naturally fellow-workers 
and friends; but its abandonment of labor to the un¬ 
mitigated effects of personal competition can never be 
accepted as the rule for the dealings of man with man. 
The love for others and for the race is as much a part 
of human natm^e as the love of self; it is a common in¬ 
stinct that man is responsible for man. The heart has 
its oracles, not less than the reason, and this is one of 
them. No practicable system of social equality has 
been brought forward, or it should, and it would have 
been adopted; it does not follow that none can be 
devised^ for there is no necessary opposition between 
handcraft and intelligence; and the masses themselves 
wiU gain the knowledge of their rights, courage to 
assert them, and self-respect to take nothing less. The 
good time is coming, when humanity wiU recognise all 
members of its family as alike entitled to its care; 
Avhen the heartless jargon of over-production in the 
midst of want wiU end in a better science of distri¬ 
bution; when man will dwell with man as with his 
brother; when political institutions will rest on the 
basis of equality and freedom. 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


515 


But this result must flow from internal activity, 
developed by universal culture; it cannot be created by 
the force of exterior philanthropy; and still less by the 
reckless violence of men whose desperate audacity 
would employ terror as a means to ride on the whirl¬ 
wind of civil war. Wliere a permanent reform appears 
to have been instantaneously effected, it will be found 
that the happy result was but the sudden plucking of 
fruit which had slowly ripened. Successful revolutions 
proceed like all other formative processes from inw^ard 
germs. The institutions of a people are always the 
reflection of its heart and its intelligence; and in pro¬ 
portion as these are purified and enlightened, must its 
public life manifest the dominion of universal reason. 

The subtle and irresistible movement of mind, 
silently but thoroughly correcting opinion and chang¬ 
ing society, brings liberty both to the soul and to the 
world. All the despotisms on eai’th cannot stay its 
coming. Every Macy that man discards is an eman¬ 
cipation ; every superstition that is thrown by, is a re¬ 
deeming from captivity. The tendency towai’ds uni¬ 
versality implies necessai’ily a tendency towards free¬ 
dom, alike of thought and in action. The faith of the 
earliest ages was of all others the grossest. Eveiy 
century of the Christian Church is less cornipt and less 
in bondage than its predecessor. The sum of spiritual 
knowledge as well as of liberty is greater, and less 
mixed with error now, than ever before. The futiue 


516 


OCCASIONAL ADDRESSES. 


shall surpass the present. The senseless strife between 
rationalism and supernaturalism will come to an end; 
an age of skepticism will not again be called an age of 
reason; and reason and religion will be found in 
accord. 

In the sphere of politics the Republican Govern¬ 
ment has long been the aspiration of the wise. “ The 
human race/' said Dante, summing up the experience 
of the Middle Age, “ is in the best condition, when it 
has the greatest degree of liberty; " and Kant, in like 
manner, giving utterance to the last word of Protes¬ 
tantism, declared the republican government to be “ the 
only true civil constitution." Its permanent establish¬ 
ment presupposes meliorating experience and appro¬ 
priate culture; but the circumstances under which it 
becomes possible, prevail more and more. Our coun¬ 
try is bound to allure the world to freedom by the 
beauty of its example. 

The course of civilization flows on like a mighty 
river through a boundless valley, calling to the streams 
from every side to swell its current, which is always 
growing wider, and deeper, and clearer, as it rolls 
along. Let us trust ourselves upon its bosom without 
fear; nay, rather with confidence and joy. Since the 
progress of the race appears to be the great purpose 
of Providence, it becomes us all to venerate the future. 
We must be ready to sacrifice ourselves for our suc¬ 
cessors, as they in their turn must live for their posterity. 


THE PROGRESS OF MANKIND. 


517 


We are not to be disheartened, that the intimate con¬ 
nection of humanity renders it impossible for any one 
portion of the civilised world to be much in advance of 
all the rest; nor are we to grieve because an unalter¬ 
able condition of perfection can never be attained. 
Every thing is in movement, and for the better, except 
only the fixed eternal law by which the necessity of 
change is established; or rather except only God, who 
includes in himself all being, all truth, and all love. 
The subject of man’s thoughts remains the same, but 
the sum of his acquisitions ever grows with time; so 
that his last system of philosophy is the best, for it in¬ 
cludes every one that went before. The last political 
state of the world, likewise, is ever more excellent than 
the old, for it presents in activity the entire inheritance 
of truth, fructified by the living mind of a more en¬ 
lightened generation. 

You, BROTHERS, wlio are joined together for the 
study of history, receive the hghted torch of civilisation 
from the departing half-centuiy, and hand it along to 
the next. In fulfilling this glorious office, remember 
that the principles of justice and sound philosophy are 
but the inspirations of common sense, and belong of 
right to all mankind. Carry them forth, therefore, to 
the whole people; for so only can society builditself up 
on the imperishable groundwork of universal freedom. 


THE END. 








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